He announced the launch of an international initiative to “enable the Sahel countries to have access to the Atlantic Ocean.” Landlocked Mali, Niger, Chad, and Burkina Faso are at the center of the Moroccan plan, which involves making Morocco’s road, port, and rail infrastructure available to them and implementing large-scale development projects.

Even if it is not detailed yet, the Moroccan initiative comes after military regimes came to power by unconstitutional means or through coups d’état, which for three of these states resulted, at various points, in having sanctions imposed on them. For example, Niger was sanctioned by the United States, European Union (EU), and European countries such as France and the Netherlands. Notably, Malian army officers who collaborated with the Wagner Group or were suspected of crimes were sanctioned by the United States. And the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS), which had sanctioned Niger, Mali, and Burkina Faso, lifted its sanctions on Niger and Mali in February this year, a month after the three Sahelian countries left the organization and soon after the countries formed the Alliance of Sahel States. Chad has not yet seen sanctions imposed after the undemocratic accession of its president following the death of his father. While the sanctions imposed on the three countries are intended to apply pressure on those who seized power by force or defied the constitution, in the hopes of restoring democratic systems, these sanctions also impact the populations.

The people in these countries are essentially penalized twice: On the one hand, they are led by governments that have revoked the right of the people to choose their leaders. On the other hand, these populations also suffer from the effects of sanctions, which cause them economic hardship, limit their access to essential goods, cut them off from the world, and deprive them of trade opportunities.

That creates a quandary for the democratic world: While sanctions are intended to target unconstitutional governments, it is the ordinary people in these countries who suffer the most from them.

Behind the initiative

Morocco’s efforts to cooperate with the states in the Sahel seem inspired by Morocco’s 2011 Constitution—mainly the preamble.

In this preamble, Morocco commits itself to supporting the Maghreb Union (which it says is a “strategic option”), deepening its bonds with the Arab-Islamic Ummah, intensifying cooperation with European countries around the Mediterranean, strengthening cooperation across Africa, and diversifying its relations with the rest of the world.

Specifically, when it comes to Africa, the preamble states that Morocco intends to “consolidate relations of cooperation and solidarity with the peoples and countries of Africa, particularly the countries of the Sahel and Sub-Saharan countries.” This short sentence helps explain Morocco’s initiative. The Moroccan Constitution does not drown the Sahel in the mass of Africa, but on the contrary highlights it by mentioning it separately. In his November 6 speech, the king of Morocco even called the Sahelian countries “African sister countries.”

In addition, the Moroccan Constitution’s commitment to the Islamic world—each of the three sanctioned countries are majority Muslim—and its pledging solidarity with the “peoples and countries of Africa” help explain Morocco’s new initiative. By specifying that its solidarity goes to the countries as well as to the peoples, Morocco is distinguishing people from the regimes that govern them.

As for the content of the Atlantic initiative, it has been received well by the Sahelian states because it offers alternatives for growth and development—and indeed, even survival. For example, Niger (one of the poorest countries in the world) depended on international aid for its annual budget, which was slashed by 40 percent in 2023 due to donors and creditors withholding support. Following the coup, malnutrition skyrocketed, only compounded by the fact that the United Nations (UN) World Food Program’s cargos were getting blocked from reaching Niger due to border closures, with one UN coordinator saying that their goal—to deliver humanitarian aid to at least 80 percent of 4.4 million vulnerable people—was in jeopardy.

The success of this initiative is contingent on several factors: It will require funding, a robust regulatory framework, efforts to address challenges such as piracy, and harmonization with and between maritime governance actors. In addition, the economic activity this initiative would create could have benefits for the governments, as well as the people, in the sanctioned Sahelian countries. However, the focus of this initiative is on helping the people, who have continued to suffer for decades.

The Atlantic advantage

The initiative underscores the importance placed—across centuries—on accessing the Atlantic Ocean. For example, El Hadj Omar Tall (founder of the Toucouleur Empire) and Samori Ture (a leader of the Wassoulou Empire) each governed landlocked areas of West Africa in the nineteenth century. Burkinabe historian Joseph Ki-Zerbo chronicled how the two African heroes, facing the inevitable advance of European colonial conquest, hurried to “capture, before it was too late, the political initiative and keep it in African hands.” They both did that by directing their troops to the ocean. Eventually, however, their efforts to reach the sea were halted by the French.

The strategic importance of the Atlantic as taught by history resonates today.

Today, over one hundred countries border the Atlantic Ocean, and importantly those countries include the world’s leading power (the United States), other permanent members of the United Nations Security Council (including the United Kingdom and France), Latin American powers (such as Argentina and Brazil), and African nations stretching from Morocco (which itself has a 1,800-mile coastline on the ocean) to South Africa.

For countries that have the means to take full advantage of their coasts, such as Morocco and Senegal, the Atlantic is a boon. Indeed, Africa’s twenty-three coastal nations are home to 46 percent of the continent’s population, 55 percent of its gross domestic product, and 57 percent of its trade. They also contain a large amount of natural resources, including oil.

But access alone won’t grant people in Sahelian countries access to the boon. Here is what is needed for this initiative to succeed:

• Defining common strategic priorities between the countries participating in this initiative and also their partners in order to focus on the most pressing issues.
• The integration of projects already underway such as the Nigeria-Morocco gas pipeline project or the Great Green Wall. Their inclusion will bring a more holistic approach to the Moroccan initiative, which focuses on road, rail, and maritime infrastructure.
• The inclusion of the African Union (through the 2050 African Integrated Maritime Strategy) as well as maritime governance mechanisms, specialized institutions, and other important stakeholders such as the Maritime Organization of West and Central Africa, African Port Management Associations, Union of African Shippers’ Councils, maritime training institutions, the UN, and the International Maritime Organization. This inclusion in discussions will help to harmonize the maritime rules and avoid double governance systems.
• Access to substantial financing, particularly via international partners such as in the private sector and development and financial institutions. Financing will be needed to support the blue economy and the modernization of road, rail, and port infrastructure.

Sahelian civilian populations have been suffering from the effects of a twenty-year war against jihadist attacks. These populations deserve peace and prosperity. After the security failures of so many domestic and foreign military interventions and the unfolding of the coups, this proposal offers a much-needed brighter perspective for these people.

Rama Yade is the senior director of the Atlantic Council’s Africa Center and senior fellow for the Europe Center.

Abdelhak Bassou is a nonresident senior fellow at the Atlantic Council’s Africa Center and a senior fellow at the Policy Center for the New South.

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Minerals often lie at the heart of this cooperation, and while the words the presidents said may have been similar, the meaning and context behind them couldn’t be more different.

Russia offers quid pro quo partnerships with promises of kinetic military, security, and political support—and assisted by faux anti-imperialist messaging. The United States, on the other hand, touts an approach that places emphasis on economic and community investment. There is a widening gulf emerging between the two models—and each model offers something that the other cannot.

Russia’s give—and take

Russia’s version of partnership has been aptly described as a “regime survival package,” in which the Russian government offers military and security assistance to struggling African governments; soon after come resource concessions for Russian companies.

This exchange has relied heavily on the Wagner Group, as the military company’s running operations allowed Moscow to distance itself via proxy. However, since the Wagner Group’s consolidation and rebranding into the Africa Corps (following the death of Wagner Group leader Yevgeniy Prigozhin), the exchange is arguably more direct and state-to-state, as Africa Corps activities are now reportedly being directed by the Russian state and managed by Russia’s military intelligence agency (the GRU) and the Kremlin. The Russian Defense Ministry, with the Africa Corps now reportedly in-house, is expanding its operations.

Russia’s offer of partnership has appealed particularly to governments in the Sahel. The Central African Republic is often viewed as the textbook case, with Wagner arriving in 2018 to push back rebels from the capital. Soon after, gold and diamond mining licenses were granted to a Russian-owned company that even the United Nations warns is “interconnected” with Wagner. And last year, Wagner helped Mali retake rebel-held areas in the north; in the months that followed, Russia and Mali signed agreements on gold refining and on oil, gas, uranium, and lithium production.

More recently, a contingent of Africa Corps personnel arrived in Burkina Faso in January to, according to the group’s Telegram channel, “ensure the safety of the country’s leader Ibrahim Traore and the Burkinabe people.” Two months later, Burkina Faso’s minister of energy, mining, and quarries told Sputnik Africa that Russian companies can become “strategic partners” in the extraction of minerals—such as gold, zinc, manganese, copper, graphite, and lithium—from mines and quarries.

Russia’s offer is currently supplanting other forms of partnership in Niger. The junta halted military cooperation with both France and the United States—whose militaries were there to help improve the security situation for Niger’s previous democratic leadership—pushing French troops to leave the country late last year and propelling the United States to agree to withdraw its forces. Earlier this month, Russian forces and military advisors arrived in Niger, equipped with an air defense system and other security equipment—a choice reflecting the fact that US forces were allocated between two airbases, from which they used drones to target militants. Once again, resources seem to be on the table in exchange for Russia’s partnership.  

While there are some actual value-added projects being developed from Russia’s deals, such as the agreement with Mali on building a gold refinery, such deals are exceptions to the rule. A number of Russia’s grandiose economic promises to Africa have failed to fully materialize. The fact is that Russia’s economic potential for Africa cannot compete with that of the West. Russia contributes less than 1 percent of the global foreign direct investment going to the continent, and when it comes to trade revenue, it’s $17.7 billion (as of 2021) is dwarfed by the United States’ $65 billion and the European Union’s (EU) $295 billion. If economic measures were the only consideration in choosing partnership, Russia likely wouldn’t make any list.

The only market where Russia leads in Africa is the arms market. Last year, Russia overtook China as the largest supplier of arms to Sub-Saharan Africa.

Part of what makes Russia so appealing as a partner—in addition to its offers of security assistance—is Russia’s ability to market itself as anti-imperialist based on the Soviet Union’s support for African countries when they were fighting for independence. For example, when the junta seized power from a French-backed president, Russia’s Prigozhin framed the coup as a liberation from Western powers. African countries still have concerns about the remaining influence wielded by former colonial powers.

How Washington works

The United States, on the other hand, makes its appeal to African countries by promising partnership on local economic development—the critical minerals discussion is only part of that partnership. The US approach is reflected in projects such as the Lobito Corridor—which is intended to make transport, including of critical minerals, from the Democratic Republic of the Congo and Zambia to Angola easier. Alongside its mineral extraction initiatives, the United States is eager to showcase regional and community benefits for its projects. 

In addition, the United States often cooperates and coordinates with its European partners when approaching investment and activity in Africa. For example, Zambia and the Democratic Republic of the Congo have signed similar agreements with both the United States and EU in which the countries agree to promote responsible mineral extraction activities that build local capacity and to bring more of the minerals value chain (including processing, manufacturing, and assembly) to the region.

Partnership with Europe can be an effective strategy for the United States, as such an approach gathers more funds, capacities, and markets. Yet, there are downsides. By tying itself with Europe, the United States ties itself to a colonial legacy. In Niger, the junta took power and quickly sought to evict French forces and EU partners—but not US forces (at least initially). This generated tension in the US-France relationship and underscored the extent to which the United States is willing to deviate from cooperation with its partners to maintain engagement in Africa. Such a method lines up with the revamped US Strategy Toward Sub-Saharan Africa under which the Biden administration has been adamant that it is seeking to partner with African countries on equal footing and that it will not treat Africa as a great-power battleground. Europe is itself aware of its history. A former Latvian prime minister, for example, called for EU members without colonial pasts to lead the bloc’s engagement with countries across Africa.

The United States, for the most part, holds its engagement conditional on the health of each country’s democracy. In the case of Niger, the United States suspended financial assistance, saying that “Any resumption of US assistance will require action . . .  to usher in democratic governance in a quick and credible timeframe.” The United States has also not shied away from terminating partnership in programs such as the African Growth and Opportunity Act (which provides duty-free entry for certain products) when the country in that partnership has seen an erosion in democratic governance, human rights, and freedoms. The United States shouldn’t shy away from doing so; but this is not a priority Russia shares.

To be fair, the United States, often alongside its European partners, does collaborate on military affairs with African countries. For example, the United States and United Kingdom joined African democratic partners in conducting a large military drill in Kenya. Many African countries, especially those that are partners with the United States, recognize the risk Russia’s support poses. Some have been vocal in making their opposition to Russia’s geopolitical actions known.

Yet, deadly incidents (and the resulting political fallout)—such as the 2017 Tongo Tongo ambush or the 1993 Battle of Mogadishu—have doused US enthusiasm for assistance with direct combat. The United States focuses on supporting roles with airpower, intelligence sharing, and training. Even France, after deploying troops across the Sahel for years in Operation Barkhane, was unwilling to deploy its forces to Niger during the coup to support the president it had backed. Compare that to Russia, which seems willing to sustain partnership with blood. When the Central African Republic’s president changed the constitution last year to abolish term limits, Russian forces in the country increased their presence and provided support and security services to the president.

The United States (especially when joining with its allies) is an economic power, and that is attractive for African countries seeking much needed domestic development and value addition. Yet, US partnership does have its limitations. Should a country’s domestic policies run afoul of American principles, partnership is near impossible. Unlike Russia’s limitations, the United States’ are largely self-imposed.

Weighing the choice

Going forward, African countries must choose wisely between the United States (and its offer of economic and development support) and Russia (and its offer of direct military support) in their search for a partner on critical minerals.

Juntas and dictatorships will likely choose Russia, even if offered another choice (which seems unlikely). Russia offers them the equipment and military support they need to fight insurgent and terrorist groups.

The West will need to closely watch democratic countries in Africa. Russia is looking to make the choice easier by deploying disinformation. France has accused Russia of even staging atrocities and framing the West to promote its narrative.

As for what the United States could do: It could theoretically start adding direct kinetic security support to its offer. However, the United States isn’t likely to align itself with military leaders who trampled democracy on their road to power, and it isn’t very likely to deploy forces to protect them. The United States could, theoretically, also turn to the private sector—supporting the efforts of private military companies that are already operating in the continent. But the government would still be limited, rightly so, by laws that restrict it from supporting nondemocratic regimes.

With African minerals in high demand, Russia and the United States will continue to offer what the other can’t.

Alexander Tripp is the assistant director for the Atlantic Council’s Africa Center.

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Read up on the events shaping the democratic world order below.

Reshaping the order

This month’s topline events

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu threatens to set a date to invade Rafah amid mounting US and international pressure to limit civilian harm. The Israeli government continued attacks across Gaza before, in early April, withdrawing all but one of its battalions and reportedly setting a date for a military operation in the city of Rafah. However, significant skepticism abounds as to whether the date is real or simply a tactic to try to pressure Hamas. The United States sought to help shape Israel’s Rafah plan given concerns for civilian casualties, but did not reach an agreement on how Israel might proceed with such an operation. The United States continued high-level pressure on the Netanyahu government to limit civilian casualties and agree on a temporary ceasefire. Vice President Kamala Harris called for an immediate temporary ceasefire and US Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer criticized Netanyahu, going so far as to call for fresh elections in Israel. Netanyahu canceled  a meeting between senior Israeli officials and US counterparts to discuss Rafah after the United States abstained from voting on a United Nations Security Council resolution pressing for an immediate temporary ceasefire in Gaza, which allowed the measure to pass, before allowing a virtual meeting to take place. Meanwhile, negotiations between Israel and Hamas in Qatar stalled after Israel claimed Hamas was “not interested” in talks; however, as April began the talks were expected to restart in Cairo. The humanitarian crisis in Gaza worsened, despite ongoing aid deliveries by air and sea. Conditions close to famine levels are now present, according to the International Court of Justice at the Hague, which also ruled unanimously that Israel must let food aid enter Gaza.

• Shaping the order. The Israel-Hamas war retains a high risk for spreading into a broader regional, state-on-state conflict. This risk heightened at the start of April as Israel reportedly killed two Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) generals and five military advisors in an airstrike on the Iranian consulate building in Damascus, Syria, which Israel claims is being used as a cover by the IRGC to conduct regional malign activities. Meanwhile, the manner in which the Netanyahu government has prosecuted the war has prompted significant debate between those viewing the tens of thousands of casualties as having driven support to Hamas and those who argue that Israel’s urban warfare conduct has actually set a new “gold standard.”  What does seem clear is that Hamas is turning battlefield losses into strategic advantage, as the United States warned Israel was the likely outcome if it went into Gaza in a way that causes mass civilian casualties and hunger.
• Hitting home. The war and humanitarian crisis being felt every day by Gazans is helping to shift US public opinion on Israel. Gallup’s March survey found that 55 percent of Americans now disagree with how Israel is conducting its war against Hamas, up from 50 percent in November. A group of eight Democrat senators pushed US President Joe Biden to end the US provision of military weapons to Jerusalem.
• What to do. In the immediate term, the United States must continue to press (and put pressure on) the Israeli government to limit civilian casualties and pursue a temporary ceasefire that would enable mass humanitarian aid to flow into Gaza and release all hostages. The Biden administration, even as it urges Netanyahu to limit civilian casualties, must mobilize key Middle Eastern partners, namely Saudi Arabia, Egypt, Qatar, Turkey, and the United Arab Emirates, to devise and resource a viable plan for post-war Gaza, a core pillar of which should be a two-state solution.

Ukraine fights on with European support while US support remains stuck in Congress. Ukraine’s strikes deep into Russian territory continued, with significant impact, including the destruction of one-third of Russian naval vessels and the brief closure of (and possible damage to) the Kerch Bridge in Crimea. Despite this progress, Ukraine faced munitions and personnel shortages that could imperil its hold on the front lines. The Verkhovna Rada, Ukraine’s parliament, debated lowering the draft age from twenty-seven to twenty-five to deal with manpower shortages, but without ammunition and with US support in doubt, morale is sagging.

The United States continued sending mixed messages on its support for Ukraine. A minority in the US Congress again held up passage of a large-scale military aid package for Kyiv, though as April started, there were signs a vote could be called soon. The Biden administration reportedly urged Kyiv not to attack Russian oil refineries, a message that generated frustration in Ukraine. Meanwhile, Europe held firm in its support for Kyiv. French President Emmanuel Macron told European allies and partners, “Today, to have peace in Ukraine, we must not be weak,” and refused to rule out Western troop deployments to Ukraine. A Czech-led ammunition initiative to supply Kyiv with artillery shells by June received additional support. Sweden announced it will help bankroll the effort with thirty million euros and Germany announced it would pay for 180,000 rounds.

• Shaping the order. US military support, in the form of weapons and munitions, along with the same from European allies, will largely determine whether Kyiv succeeds or fails on the battlefield. The minority in the US Congress preventing the military aid bill from passing is sending a message to Russia (and China) that US resolve might not hold. Absent continued US and European military support, Ukraine could lose the war. This would likely embolden Russian President Vladimir Putin to attack NATO countries and in so doing draw the United States directly into a land war in Europe to defend a NATO ally.
• Hitting home. Ukraine defeating Russia is a plausible outcome and would advance US national interests by weakening a US adversary without costing US soldiers. Despite these realities, a minority in Congress continued holding up further military support to Ukraine. Many Europeans are alarmed by rising isolationism in the United States, particularly following Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán’s claims that former US President Donald Trump had told him he would end military aid to Ukraine should he be elected.
• What to do. The Biden administration must continue to push Congress to pass military aid for Ukraine and work with its allies in Europe to continue their support for Kyiv.

Senegal’s democracy shows resilience. On March 24, Senegalese citizens elected Bassirou Diomaye Faye as president, just ten days after his release from prison. The election was initially scheduled for February 25, until Sall, in office for twelve years, announced a delay and pushed for legislation that rescheduled the contest for December 2024. The opposition and some analysts feared that Sall wanted to delay the election to extend his time in power; although in February, Sall promised to end his term in April. However, the Constitutional Court rejected the plan to postpone the elections and ordered the government to set the date for elections, which it set as March 24. Many had feared that the postponement of the election would result in violence, after security forces violently responded to protests against the election delay. 

• Shaping the order. Democracy in West Africa has been on the backfoot following a string of coups across the Sahel. Senegal, which looked at risk of backsliding after the unfolding of these events, showed the importance of strong and independent institutions in restoring democracy.
• Hitting home. A democratic and stable Senegal benefits the United States. More broadly, the United States benefits when there are more democracies in the world. Democracies are more reliable trading partners, are less likely to go to war with one another, and are less likely to incubate and export transnational crime and terrorism.
• What to do. The United States should continue pursuing partnerships with the new government on a range of economic, cultural, and security matters.

Quote of the Month

“My purpose tonight is to both wake up this Congress and alert the American people that this is no ordinary moment either . . . What makes our moment rare is that freedom and democracy are under attack, both at home and overseas, at the very same time.”
– Biden in his State of the Union address before the US Congress.

State of the Order this month: Weakened

Assessing the five core pillars of the democratic world order

Democracy (↓)

• In the first Iranian election since protests erupted in 2022 following the death of Mahsa Amini, many Iranians boycotted parliamentary elections, seemingly expressing, by refusing to cast a ballot, their opposition to the government’s oppressive rules and handling of the economy.
• Venezuela’s regime officially blocked the leading opposition candidate, Corina Yoris, from running in July’s presidential elections, a major blow to opposition hopes to unseat Nicolas Maduro. The regime’s decision is also a setback for the Biden administration, which lifted sanctions on Venezuela’s oil industry in an effort to encourage Maduro to hold free and fair elections.
• Article 23, Hong Kong’s new security law, came into effect, enabling officials to conduct closed-door trials and allowing the police to hold individuals for up to sixteen days without bringing charges for violating state secrets, fomenting sedition, and engaging in treason, all of which have broad definitions under the law. Radio Free Asia shut down its office in Hong Kong due to fears that its staff could endangered.
• India put in place a new citizenship law that excludes Muslim migrants and establishes a religious test for migrants of prominent faiths in South Asia other than Islam. Experts say that under Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s government, Muslims have faced increased discrimination.
• On balance, the democracy pillar was weakened.

Security (↓)

• Haitian Prime Minister Ariel Henry resigned from office, following a meeting in Jamaica of the United States, Caribbean partners, Canada, and France. An alliance of gangs, which has sowed instability across the country, including by releasing thousands of prisoners from government facilities and controlling most of the capital, had threatened civil war if Henry did not resign.
• Islamic State of Iraq and al-Sham–Khorasan (ISIS-K), launched an attack on a concert hall in Moscow that left at least 144 dead. The group claimed responsibility but Putin has continued to link the attack to Ukraine.
• The United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF) warned that the number of individuals experiencing female genitalia mutilation increased by 15 percent in the last eight years, with UNICEF Executive Director Catherine Russell stating that these unnecessary procedures are happening at younger and younger ages, sometimes even before children reach the age of five.
• On balance, the security pillar was weakened.

Trade ()

• Chinese Premier Li Qiang announced that China’s economic growth goal is 5 percent; however, he offered few details on how China would increase growth, even as its real estate crisis continued and public confidence in China’s economy declined.
• The Bank of Japan, after eight years of negative interest rates, increased short-term interest rates to 0-0.1 percent, demonstrating the central bank’s confidence in the country’s economic recovery and sustainable inflation.
• On balance, the trade pillar was unchanged.

Commons ()

• The oil and gas company Shell initiated court proceedings to formally repeal the 2021 ruling wherein a district court in The Hague ordered Shell to cut its carbon emissions by 45 percent by 2030 compared to 2019 levels.
• On balance, the commons pillar was unchanged.

Alliances (↑)

• Sweden formally joined NATO, strengthening the Alliance and positioning it to better defend its northern flank.
• On balance, the alliances pillar was strengthened.

Strengthened (↑)________Unchanged ()________Weakened (↓)

What is the democratic world order? Also known as the liberal order, the rules-based order, or simply the free world, the democratic world order encompasses the rules, norms, alliances, and institutions created and supported by leading democracies over the past seven decades to foster security, democracy, prosperity, and a healthy planet.

This month’s top reads

Three must-read commentaries on the democratic order

• Liselotte Odgaard, in Foreign Policy, argues that NATO is not ready to deter Russia in the Arctic.
• Hal Brands, in Foreign Affairs, contends that new autocratic alliances are a genuine threat.
• Sahar Halaimazi, Metra Mehran, and Marika Theros, as part of a project examining Afghanistan’s gender apartheid, map the timeline of the Taliban’s decrees restricting women.

Action and analysis by the Atlantic Council

Our experts weigh in on this month’s events

• Frederick Kempe, in Inflection Points Today, assesses that the United States needs to make the case for winning the “strategic battle for the global future,” including by banning TikTok and passing aid to Ukraine.
• Jenna Ben-Yehuda and Matthew Kroenig, in the New Atlanticist, respond to Biden’s State of the Union address.
• Andrew Michta and Jeffrey Cimmino, as part of the Scowcroft Center’s project on twenty-first-century diplomacy, analyze the risks and benefits of generative artificial intelligence for diplomacy.
• Jerzy Koźmiński and Daniel Fried, in the New Atlanticist, discuss NATO enlargement on the twenty-fifth anniversary of Poland, Hungary, and the Czech Republic joining the Alliance.
• Patrick Quirk, in the Hill, argues that technology companies and Russian democracy activists must work together to combat Putin’s online authoritarianism.
• Samantha Vinograd, on Face the Nation, analyzed the ISIS-K terror attack in Moscow.
• Jeffrey Cimmino, in the New Atlanticist, lays out how the United States can play a bigger role in protecting religious freedom across the globe.

__________________________________________________

The Democratic Order Initiative is an Atlantic Council initiative aimed at reenergizing American global leadership and strengthening cooperation among the world’s democracies in support of a rules-based democratic order. Sign on to the Council’s Declaration of Principles for Freedom, Prosperity, and Peace by clicking here.

Patrick Quirk – Nonresident Senior Fellow
Dan Fried – Distinguished Fellow
Sydney Sherry – Program Assistant

If you would like to be added to our email list for future publications and events, or to learn more about the Democratic Order Initiative, please email pquirk@atlanticcouncil.org.

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Freedom of assembly, freedom of opinion, and democracy are not just American values, “they are human values. They are also African values,” said Succès Masra, the prime minister of the Republic of Chad, on Wednesday.

Formerly the leader of the opposition Transformers party, Masra fled to the United States in the aftermath of the “Black Thursday” crackdown on dissent by the military government in October 2022. Now, after negotiations between the opposition and Chad’s government brokered by the Democratic Republic of Congo, Masra has returned to his home country and was appointed prime minister of Chad’s transition government in January. In this role, Masra has been working toward Chad’s democratic transition and reforming the country’s governmental and electoral institutions. Masra has yet to announce whether he will be a candidate in the May 6 presidential elections.

Molly Phee, assistant secretary for African affairs at the US Department of State, opened the conversation with Masra, urging the international community to support Chad’s transition government as it seeks to build stronger, more inclusive, democratic institutions and serve as an example throughout the region. Below are more highlights from Masra’s discussion of Chad’s democratic transition, economic ambitions, and the role the country should play in the region, which was moderated by Rama Yade, the senior director of the Atlantic Council’s Africa Center.

Democratic transition and reforms

• Masra said that the transitional government’s first priority was establishing governmental and electoral institutions. “Unless we have strong institutions, nothing sustainable can happen,” he said. The war in Sudan, he added, showed that “if everybody has weapons, it’s not enough to build a strong country. It’s important to make sure that institutions are also here to help.”
• These institutions include a new independent body for organizing elections and a reform to enhance the independence of the judiciary. “These are new tools that we are putting on the table to push for fair elections,” Masra said.
• Another aspect of the electoral reform initiatives is to “push for citizen involvement,” said Masra. “Our ambition is to train fifty thousand volunteers” to help with the elections in the next few weeks, he said, which will require help from institutions in the United States, civil society actors, and members of the African diaspora.
• “But we still have challenges ahead,” Masra acknowledged, which include financing the electoral process. “This is where we can also expect some support.”

Economic goals

• Masra outlined an initiative for “minimum development packages,” which would ensure that every village has a school, health system, clean water facility, road, and access to energy. Unless Chad “bets on education,” Masra said, “there is nothing sustainable we can accomplish yesterday, today, or tomorrow. The world is led by ideas.”
• “We want a Chad which could become tomorrow’s startup nation,” where both local and international actors want to invest, said Masra, who was formerly the chief economist at the African Development Bank. “This is not about philanthropy. This is about business.”
• Masra also highlighted the importance of facilitating trade among African countries, including promoting e-visas, ensuring free travel, expanding regional markets, and making the most of the African Continental Free Trade Area.

Chad’s international role

• Concerning the series of coups in the Sahel countries of Niger, Mali, and Burkina Faso, Masra said that “the reality of security and the obligation for leaders to respond to people’s needs remain the same.” Even during war, “people should continue to talk,” he said. “We speak to everybody, with the idea to use Chad as a regional player.”
• “The United States is a partner for our country, and I’m here to say we want to build a stronger partnership,” said Masra. Ongoing areas of cooperation between the United States and Chad, he said, include security, private sector development, and “pushing for a soft landing” in Chad “where people can choose their leaders.”
• “Africa must unite. This is mandatory,” Masra said, urging greater African involvement in global institutions. That means “it’s important to have a place” in the United Nations Security Council, he added.
• Before concluding, Masra called for “hope” for Chad, stating that “there is a new Chad, a new Africa, and we can build bridges” together.

Watch the full event

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The Rethinking Stability initiative was a partnership between Interpeace, the Atlantic Council, and the Bundesakademie für Sicherheitspolitik (BAKS). The initiative was made possible thanks to the generous contributions of the German Federal Foreign Office.

In the last twenty years, stabilization has become perhaps the main approach through which international actors have engaged in conflict affected areas. Yet almost all stabilization efforts have struggled, with the sources of instability more complicated and difficult to remedy than first envisaged. The definition of what ‘stabilization’ actually constitutes remains ambiguous, with the term used inconsistently over time and in different contexts, so that aims and approaches have varied enormously in ambition and application between actor and place. Stabilization successes have been scant, and the field appears to be in something of a definitional and operational limbo, where despite their stated purpose of reducing violence and laying the structural foundations for longer-term security, most stabilization efforts have too often not only failed but occasionally made conflict environments worse.

This context provided the rationale for the Rethinking Stability initiative. Launched in July 2020, it recognized that stabilization efforts in Afghanistan, the Sahel, and in north, east and central Africa were all struggling to build lasting peace and stability. The initiative sought to ask why, and in doing so discern how stabilization efforts could better contribute to positive social and political changes in fragile environments.

Based on five private dialogues on three continents, in-depth desk and country research, and discussions with circa 1,000 policy makers, academics, practitioners, and conflict-affected citizens, this final paper sets out the project’s key lessons and suggests actionable recommendations for how the field can improve.

The Transatlantic Security Initiative, in the Scowcroft Center for Strategy and Security, shapes and influences the debate on the greatest security challenges facing the North Atlantic Alliance and its key partners.

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The Scowcroft Strategy Initiative works to develop sustainable, nonpartisan strategies to tackle security challenges.

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Then there is what did not happen. On July 30, Bola Tinubu, the Nigerian president and Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS) chair, gave the coup leaders a one-week ultimatum to restore the country’s previous leadership or face a military intervention from the regional bloc—a deadline that came and went with no action. On August 10, ECOWAS leaders met and issued a statement with a mixed message: it ordered the activation of a “standby force,” but also resolved to “keep all options on the table for the peaceful resolution of the crisis.”

Below, Atlantic Council experts answer the crucial questions these developments raise for policymakers in the Sahel, Europe, and the United States.

Click to jump to a question:

1. Why has ECOWAS backed away from its ultimatum?

2. Did the coup in Niger just succeed?

3. What is at stake for France and the European Union?

4. Should the United States now get more involved?

5. Have Burkina Faso and Mali come out stronger by supporting the coup?

6. What does this reveal about Nigeria’s regional leadership?

1. Why has ECOWAS backed away from its ultimatum?

Tinubu is politically weak and facing significant pushback domestically, including from major northern Nigerian Muslim leaders. He was only recently elected after a contested election, and his recent decisions aimed at improving Nigeria’s economy, above all his move to end Nigeria’s fuel subsidy, are unpopular and causing disruption to the economy. At the same time, Nigeria is struggling with its own insurgencies in northern Nigeria, and northern Nigerians and southern Nigeriens are more or less the same people. There is a great deal of cross-border movement and commerce, which sanctions disrupt. While many Nigerians, northerners included, appreciate that the coup hurts their neighbor’s stability and security, they also appreciate the harm done by sanctions and have a difficult time rallying to the idea of a military intervention.

In addition, in practical terms, marshaling a military force requires more time and planning than Tinubu probably realized. These countries tend not to have significant rapid reaction forces; they can’t just drop battalions wherever they want on short notice, as France and the United States can. What exactly would Nigeria and ECOWAS do if they could put together the required forces? But the longer it takes, the more politically untenable any military intervention becomes.

ECOWAS’s failure to effect any change will be a blow to its influence. There will be important ramifications in terms of ECOWAS’s relations with Burkina Faso, Guinea, and Mali, which all have juntas that ECOWAS has been pushing to transition to civilian rule. ECOWAS has forced them to accept “transition timetables” for holding elections and has been trying to push these juntas to comply. ECOWAS’s ability to do so is much reduced by this affair. The region’s juntas, I am sure, feel emboldened.

—Michael Shurkin is a nonresident senior fellow with the Atlantic Council’s Africa Center.

Besides setting an initial deadline that gave the putschists time to consolidate support within the Nigerien military and rally the Nigerien population, especially among the youth, against what it could point to as outside interference, ECOWAS violated the first rule of diplomatic engagement: never make a promise or a threat unless you are prepared to follow through. ECOWAS has never successfully intervened to reverse a coup. (The case of Senegal’s intervention in The Gambia in 2017 is a unique circumstance that does not really count. The Gambia is a very small country surrounded on three sides by Senegal, whose army was the force mandated by ECOWAS to intervene in a case where a president was refusing to accept an election loss.) Moreover, ECOWAS has not prepared for an intervention in Niger. In the end, only two members, Senegal and Côte d’Ivoire, would even say that they would support a military intervention with forces and they offered no specific commitments.

This elementary mistake was compounded by another one by Nigeria: never make an international commitment unless you have broad domestic support. Tinubu soon found that the Nigerian senate, where his party holds the majority, would not back intervention and both the main Muslim umbrella organization led by the sultan of Sokoto and the Nigerian Catholic Bishops’ Conference came out against the use of force.

—J. Peter Pham is a distinguished fellow at the Atlantic Council’s Africa Center. Previously, he served as the first-ever US special envoy for the Sahel region.

I am not sure that ECOWAS has backed away from its ultimatum. The last news I read was calling for a meeting of the chiefs of staff of the member states. Nevertheless, I do agree that a military intervention is highly unlikely for a simple reason: the lack of military capabilities, especially for the transportation of troops. At a minimum, logistical support from the United States or France would be a requisite, and I doubt the two countries would be ready to provide it. A de facto blockade of Niger may be the decision by default, even if its effectiveness would be limited.

—Gérard Araud is a distinguished fellow with the Atlantic Council’s Europe Center and a former ambassador of France to the United States (2014-2019).

The ultimatum was conceived as a negotiation strategy rather than a timetable to prepare for an intervention. ECOWAS hoped to push the junta to back off. If the likelihood of the intervention decreased with time, though, Niger is still not off the hook. Coastal ECOWAS countries understand that much is at stake and if putschists in Niamey aren’t put in line, their own political survival is at risk. Successful examples are appealing. That’s why ECOWAS decided at today’s meeting to retain intervention as an option on the table. However, it’s still more likely that ECOWAS would rather exercise its pressure through sanctions, which have an even greater potential to bite than in the case of Mali or Burkina Faso.  

—Petr Tůma is a visiting fellow at the Atlantic Council’s Europe Center.

2. Did the coup in Niger just succeed?

Yes, the coup succeeded, as France decided not to intervene in its first hours. Now it is too late.

—Gérard Araud

Yes. The only hope for reversing it is a domestic rebellion and possible civil war. A prominent Tuareg former rebel leader has announced he was forming a group to do precisely that. Western countries should stay far away from him.

—Michael Shurkin

Yes.  The “golden hour” for reversing a coup is the first day or two, at most. After that, it becomes very difficult unless there is active opposition within the military. In Niger, to avoid fratricidal conflict, the senior brass acquiesced to the coup. And with the appointment of a new cabinet, the junta is increasingly getting settled in.

—J. Peter Pham

New Atlanticist

Aug 3, 2023

What Niger’s coup means for West Africa’s geopolitical contest

By Rama Yade

The ongoing coup in Niamey and others that have taken place in West Africa in recent years reflect significant geopolitical changes underway.

Africa Conflict

3. What is at stake for France and the European Union?

The coup is confirming the collapse of France’s policy in the Sahel, which it has implemented since its intervention in Mali in 2013 and, more widely, of its policy in Francophone Africa. The question is whether it will stop there or if it will affect other countries where the same anti-French feeling is flaming (Senegal?). France has to radically change its policy: this will be painful for its armed forces, which have always played a major role in its conception. For the European Union (EU), the questions will be more pedestrian: How to relate with military juntas? How to dissociate itself from France without antagonizing it?

—Gérard Araud

In the aftermath of the 2021 Mali military coup, when the junta opted for cooperation with the Wagner group, France and its European partners had to withdraw their forces from the country. As Burkina Faso suffered a military coup soon after, Niger appeared as the best option for Europeans to continue helping local governments in fighting against terrorism. Importantly, Russia had no presence in the country. The current coup risks upending European military deployments not only in Niger but also in the broader Sahel region, as there are not many other options available. One can still consider Chad or Mauritania, but these are fortunately not the hot spots of terrorist activities.  

Further instability in Niger, which may follow if the coup succeeds, could become an even bigger challenge for Europeans than Mali or Burkina Faso. One of the main migration routes to the southern Mediterranean coast from Sub-Saharan Africa goes through Niger, namely the city of Agadez, a well-known regional crossroad for migrants.  

—Petr Tůma

France clearly is suffering a blow to its prestige and influence in the region. (France will be fine in the long term—the Sahel just isn’t that important to it.) Recent events have proven that there is not much France can do that will not be negatively perceived by many if not most Sahelians, regardless of France’s intentions or the utility of French assistance. It is time for France to leave Africa and close its bases there.

The EU can weather this storm, as other bloc members do not provoke the same allergic reaction that France does. That said, the coup almost certainly will exacerbate the region’s security problems, which among other things adds to the refugee crisis.

—Michael Shurkin

France will probably have to withdraw its 1,500 troops from Niger, dealing another blow to its postcolonial ambitions of having a special role in its former colonies. The junta has already announced the withdrawal of Niger from five different military and security cooperation agreements. In many respects, the fact that the coup was not reversed and Bazoum was not rescued from his safe room in the first hours of the mutiny are indicative of the state of affairs. In the heyday of Françafrique, there is no question of how it would have played out. To use another French term, the dénouement is complete.

—J. Peter Pham

4. Should the United States now get more involved?

Yes. The United States can go where France cannot and should not. It can and should do more in terms of all manner of assistance. The catch is that by essentially acquiescing to the coup in Niger, not to mention those in Burkina Faso, Guinea, and Mali, it is betraying its own rhetoric regarding democracy promotion. 

—Michael Shurkin

Yes. Not only has the United States made a significant investment—over $500 million in military assistance and roughly $2 billion in humanitarian and development aid over a decade, stretching across three administrations of both parties, as well as lives sacrificed, something we should not forget—but that commitment has paid off in gains on both the security and human development fronts. The first six months of this year saw the lowest levels of extremist violence in Niger since 2018—and this was at a time when the Global Terrorism Index recorded jihadist activity spiking across the rest of the Sahel.

Moreover, it is rather telling that while anti-French rhetoric has reached a fever pitch in Niger and the French embassy was even attacked by mobs who set its gates on fire, there has not been a single protestor at the new US Embassy nor any call for the departure of the more than one thousand US military personnel on the two air bases in Niger.

Acting Deputy Secretary of State Victoria Nuland mentioned an offer of US “good offices.” The United States can do that as well as much more. It is in the United States’ own interests.

—J. Peter Pham

ECOWAS should take the lead and the United States should support it. Yet, there is space for parallel US diplomatic engagement in explaining to the junta what it would really mean to cut cooperation with the West, as well as the pitfalls of getting into bed with Russia.  

—Petr Tůma

The United States may be tempted to step in for the reasons other experts have emphasized, but I am deeply skeptical considering what has happened in Niger: a fairly correct democratic process, a reformed French policy striving to respect local sensitivities, an approval of the French presence by the parliament, etc., and still, a military coup. I understand that military requirements will lead the United States to try to stay in Niger, but any legitimization of the junta would be a blow to our friends within ECOWAS.

—Gérard Araud

5. Have Burkina Faso and Mali come out stronger by supporting the coup?

In terms of popular opinion, yes, although Niger’s decline over the long term only compounds their own problems.

—Michael Shurkin

No. Despite getting some publicity for chest-thumping, especially from Captain Ibrahim Traoré, the head of the junta in Burkina Faso, their own inadequacies showed even more clearly. At the end of the day, for all the talk of declarations of war and standing by Niger, all they could do was send a joint delegation in “solidarity.” This is no surprise since both countries have enough of a challenge fighting extremists in their own territory and no capacity for even getting forces deployed abroad even if they had them.

—J. Peter Pham

Yes, Mali and Burkina Faso may see the coup in Niger, the closest partner of France in the region, as a political success and the confirmation of popular support for their policies. It may also have an echo elsewhere in the region.

—Gérard Araud

I don’t believe so, especially from a long-term perspective. Both countries are economically dependent on cooperation and aid coming from abroad. Their behavior, which contributes to instability in the region, will certainly make their partners and donors more reluctant, and working with Russia will not make up for it. Their project is not sustainable in the long run, especially amid the spread of terrorism, which is likely to follow the current turmoil. 

—Petr Tůma

6. What does this reveal about Nigeria’s regional leadership?

It shows that Nigeria’s leadership is limited by its own domestic problems, as well as the popular sentiment that views it and ECOWAS as instruments of Western powers, however irrational that view is.

—Michael Shurkin

The problem with Nigeria’s foreign policy has always been its domestic limitations, but it also suffers from the dismal state of its military forces, as has been shown in United Nations peacekeeping operations.

—Gérard Araud

The ongoing crisis—with a new putschist alliance being shaped in the region—creates an even stronger demand for leadership among ECOWAS countries. It will depend on how the situation evolves, but there’s a good chance that it’ll further strengthen Abuja’s position in the region. There are still plenty of options for pressuring Niger’s junta beyond military intervention and Nigeria is well-positioned here.

—Petr Tůma

A “work-in-progress” would be a generous characterization.

—J. Peter Pham

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On August 4, Foreign Policy published its biweekly “It’s Debatable” column featuring Scowcroft Center Vice President and Senior Director Matthew Kroenig and Emma Ashford assessing the latest news in international affairs.

In their latest article, Kroenig and Ashford debate the impetus of coups in fragile states, using the recent 2023 Niger coup as an emblematic case study. Does US military training of foreign officials inflate the tendency for coups, and other instances of state-based violence? Or are underlying economic and institutional concerns the catalyzing factor?

Staff

Matthew Kroenig

Vice President and Senior Director, Scowcroft Center for Strategy and Security

Scowcroft Center for Strategy and Security

China Defense Policy

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In Africa too, the ongoing coup in Niger seems to trigger a harder reaction than the previous ones in Mali and Burkina Faso. After earlier sending Chadian President Mahamat Idriss Déby to Niger to lead mediation talks, the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS)—under Nigerian President Bola Tinubu’s leadership—threatened to use force if the coup leaders don’t reinstate Nigerien President Mohamed Bazoum by August 6 and announced new sanctions, harder than those used for other junta-led Sahelian countries. That is predicted to deal a blow to Niger, a country that depends on external aid. This unusual firm answer can be explained by several reasons:

• First, there is a strong fear that the region may collapse now that the G5 Sahel—a regional group of countries promoting development and security—is led by four juntas. Among the five members, Burkina Faso, Niger, Mali, and Chad have recently experienced an undemocratic transition; Mauritania remains. Niger is the fifth country in West Africa to experience a coup d’état over the past three years.

• Second, despite numerous African Union and ECOWAS sanctions over the past few years, the regional coup leaders seem to taunt the African organizations for whom this recent coup in Niger is an ultimate test of credibility.

• Third, Nigeria—which chairs ECOWAS and shares a one-thousand-mile border with Niger—needs a win in this moment, as Tinubu just assumed presidential office a little over two months ago. 

The coup in Niger seems to have been triggered by a very light justification: Bazoum was reportedly going to remove the military head, which is far from the typical reasons—or excuses—given for coups, such as security or governance failures. Even while the country faced attacks coming from groups ranging from the local branch of the Islamic State of Iraq and al-Sham (ISIS) to Boko Haram, Bazoum was doing better than his neighbors (but obviously not enough) to remain in power—his ability to remain in power was surprising given the weakness of his security guard and his support base. The alarm signaling that weakness had been blaring even before Bazoum’s inauguration, as a group attempted a coup just two days before the then president-elect’s swearing-in ceremony in March 2021. One of the sources of that weakness may have been his attachment to his partnership with France, as his internal opponents vocally criticized his France-friendly policy.

For Paris, a lot is on the line. Its remaining influence in the Sahel is collapsing. As of earlier this summer, 2,500 of its troops were based in Chad and Niger—France’s last two key strategic partners in the region. The troops were left without any clear roadmap after Operation Barkhane ended in 2022 and France withdrew from Mali after ten years of presence; French-commanded European troops under the Takuba Task Force also withdrew from Mali at the time, while French troops who were part of Operation Sabre withdrew from Burkina Faso less than a year later. A total withdrawal from Niger would be a disaster for France, which is why the coup has occupied French attention. France’s vital interests in Africa have been hit. 

The French government has seemed to run out of solutions to the region’s challenges. But critics are wondering why France thinks it needs to get things under control in Africa; even before the coup, those critics wondered why a military answer to the problems in the Sahel (an answer that has already failed) is still and exclusively on the table. And in finding new answers to this problem, it isn’t just about adjusting aid to the region: France needs to change its paradigm. A growing part of the French population, including experts in military and security circles, are aligned with these views and are requesting changes.

There is still time for the French government to do things differently. It can renew old networks and reshape its Africa policy for its approach toward Cote d’Ivoire, Senegal, and Gabon (its other West African partners), countries that have been shaken by demonstrations questioning French presence. At this point, these countries are still in the situation to welcome the French troops without risking domestic political turmoil.

Africa has deeply changed; the new generation, with a politically conscious middle class, has demands. They won’t accept double or low standards when it comes to Africa. This motivation is stronger than the generation’s so-called attachment to Russia, a geopolitical player that opportunistically wants to advance its interests in the region by raising its flags at demonstrations. That scene unfolded last week in Niger as the Russia-Africa Summit kicked off over five thousand miles away in St. Petersburg, without Bazoum in attendance (he had already planned not to attend the summit). Of course, speculation was rife about Russia’s involvement in the coup given this timing, even though Russia recently condemned the coup.

This coup and others that have taken place across West Africa in recent years reflect significant geopolitical changes underway, from France’s retreat to Russia’s angling for opportunity, but also the need of West African governments to be better supported by their partners and allies. Most Africans don’t explicitly want to oust France or other Western partners from their countries: Instead, they are seeking a renewed partnership on a healthier and more equal basis. When it comes to the war against jihadists, Africans expect more wins than a ten-year military presence. To renew their partnerships globally, African governments are diversifying their roster of international partners, adding countries such as China, Turkey, Israel, and India to their lists. Niger itself has worked with China for years on oil exploration—which has included work on a pipeline that runs from Niger to Benin—and it has worked with Western allies such as Canada on uranium.

As these geopolitical changes have unfolded, Niger has seen many domestic challenges, including coups—experiencing four since its independence in 1960—in addition to other attempts to cut back on the government’s power such as Tuareg rebellions. In recent years, the country has also seen terrorist attacks launched by ISIS affiliate groups, al-Qaeda affiliate groups, and Boko Haram. As a landlocked and desert country with a population of about 26 million people (about half of whom live below the poverty line) and with the highest birth rate in the world, hardships are accumulating in Niger; the region’s coups and terrorist activity make those hardships even worse. 

Knowing the severity of these hardships, and knowing that a few officers abandoned the Nigerien government in the hours leading up to its fall, one may wonder on what basis these regimes rested: the much-vaunted popular vote or the police? If a military leader tried to bring down a government every time he or she had personal concerns that contradicted elected leaders—whether it be France’s General Pierre de Villiers or US General Mark Milley—many governments based on the popular vote would have already fallen apart. This problem is much deeper than a simple dispute; it is about the strength of the institutions. The Sahelian governments don’t have such strong institutions, as they face pressure from terrorist movements that aim to see institutions crumble. 

Russia is quick to lend its support to countries under coup leadership, solidifying its role as a partner to these countries. But the West, in striking contrast, tends to stick with old paradigms, easily exploited by Russia in its misinformation strategy. At times, Western partners—who know at least one way to save threatened regimes (via defense agreements)—seem no longer able to find their satellite navigation quickly enough to rescue government leaders held in their residences (such as Burkina Faso’s Roch Marc Christian Kaboré, Mali’s Ibrahim Boubacar Keïta, or Niger’s Bazoum). Caught between inefficient strategies and noninterference, Africa’s Western partners are leaving these presidents to face their downfall without any strategy that would help them to connect with the civilian populations and their request of renewed partnership.

Russia, determined to prove that it is not isolated after the international response to the war in Ukraine, has been able to use Africa to circumvent Western economic sanctions and rebuild its forces via the Wagner Group, which is active in the Central African Republic and Mali. There, the countries’ gold, diamonds, and sugar serve as bargaining chips for the security services of the private militia. The United States, meanwhile, has redirected its focus to the European continent to support Ukraine and also to protect its strategic interests. But the Niger events show that US strategic interests still run through Africa.

However, while the field may be wide open for Russia, it may not be so easily navigable. After all, Russian troops are blamed, along with Malian forces, for the terrible March 2022 massacre in Moura, which will haunt the Sahel for a long time. And Russia is starting to appear weaker globally, especially after Wagner Group leader Yevgeniy Prigozhin’s rebellion exposed the leaks in the Russian defense apparatus. The redeployment of Wagner’s forces to Africa following their ousting from the Ukrainian ground was also negatively perceived in African circles. 

Even the Russia-Africa Summit has revealed a weakened impression of Moscow: This year’s convening in St. Petersburg gathered only seventeen heads of state, whereas the first convening in Sochi in October 2019 gathered forty-three heads of state—as Russia was just beginning to re-engage with the continent for the first time since the fall of the Soviet Union. Russia’s recent suspension of the agreement to export grain from Ukraine only accelerated the weakening of its image on the continent. Clearly, Africa remains a challenge for Russia, too.

Rama Yade is the senior director of the Atlantic Council’s Africa Center and a senior fellow at the Europe Center. She is a professor at Sciences Po Paris and Mohammed 6 Polytechnic University in Morocco. She was a member of the French cabinet, serving as deputy minister for foreign affairs and human rights and ambassador to UNESCO.

The post What Niger’s coup means for West Africa’s geopolitical contest appeared first on Atlantic Council.

Back to war in Western Sahara

The conflict between Morocco and the Western Sahara’s pro-independence Polisario Front goes back to the end of Spanish colonial rule. It was ignited in 1975 after Spain relinquished control of Spanish Sahara, later known as Western Sahara. Morocco and Mauritania divided the territory between themselves, while the pro-independence Polisario Front, backed by Algeria, proclaimed a Sahrawi Arab Democratic Republic and launched a military struggle against what it viewed as two occupying powers. Mauritania withdrew from its part of the territory in 1979 after a series of military defeats at the hands of the Polisario, leaving it to Morocco. Over the following years, Rabat consolidated control over most of Western Sahara, building a defensive wall along the entire territory known as the “sand berm,” which de facto left 80 percent of the area in Moroccan hands and 20 percent under Polisario control. 

The ensuing military stalemate laid the basis for a 1991 UN-mediated settlement plan, which established a cease-fire and a UN buffer zone along the sand berm; called for a self-determination referendum; and set up a mission, MINURSO, to monitor the cease-fire and organize the referendum. The vote never took place due to Moroccan objections. Subsequent negotiations failed to achieve a breakthrough, even though the two sides continued to abide by the cease-fire. In 2007, under pressure from France and the United States, Morocco proposed an autonomy plan that would provide for a degree of self-government for Western Sahara under its sovereignty. The Polisario rejected it out of hand for denying the Sahrawi population’s right to self-determination.

The conflict remained frozen until a series of events in 2019-2021 reignited hostilities, spreading tensions through the wider region. Starting in 2019, Rabat convinced a number of Arab and African governments to open consulates in Morocco-controlled Western Sahara, signaling their recognition of Rabat’s sovereignty over the territory. In November 2020, the 1991 cease-fire collapsed when Morocco seized a section of the UN buffer zone to clear a blockade of a key route by Polisario activists and in response the Front resumed its attacks against Morocco in Western Sahara. Tensions escalated further in December 2020 when the Donald Trump administration extended US recognition to Morocco’s control of Western Sahara, and again in August 2021, when Algeria broke off diplomatic relations with Morocco, partly over the latter’s unilateral moves in Western Sahara.

A low-intensity conflict

The intensity of the hostilities over Western Sahara during the conflict’s latest round has remained fairly limited, mainly due to a military imbalance in favor of Rabat. Since the end of the cease-fire in 2020, the Polisario has been able to do little more than fire at the Moroccan sand berm in a series of hit-and-run attacks. Yet the vast majority of its attacks are confined to a northeastern section of the former UN buffer zone inside Western Sahara, suggesting that the group is unable to carry out attacks in the rest of the territory. The Front largely demobilized after the 1991 cease-fire, maintaining only minimal forces; it then lost one of its main arms suppliers, Libya’s Muammar al-Qaddafi, in 2011, leaving it mostly dependent on outdated equipment. Morocco, from its side, can deploy technologically advanced weapons, including drones, which have granted it air superiority.

The most destabilizing incidents have come from alleged Moroccan attacks on Algerian and Mauritanian civilian convoys. These have threatened to widen the conflict to the rest of the region. In November 2021, an alleged Moroccan drone strike in Polisario-controlled Western Sahara resulted in the deaths of three Algerian truck drivers en route to Mauritania. The incident prompted the Algerian presidency to publicly pin the blame on Rabat and vow retaliation. A second such incident occurred in April 2022, when Algeria accused the Moroccan air force of killing another three people in an attack on a civilian truck convoy near the Mauritanian border.

More recently, an attack inside Moroccan-controlled Western Sahara has highlighted the potential for further military escalation. On May 20, an alleged bomb attack reportedly targeted a segment of a 100-kilometer conveyor belt used by Morocco to export phosphates from a mine located deep within Western Sahara to the coast. Moroccan and pro-Polisario media outlets refrained from reporting on this incident, but the pro-Polisario nongovernmental organization Western Sahara Resource Watch released a series of videos supporting the claim that the incident had happened. If the incident did in fact take place, it would mark the first such attack in Moroccan-controlled Western Sahara since the cease-fire’s collapse. While the fact that neither side publicized the alleged event suggests a shared interest in avoiding an escalation at this stage, this kind of attack hints at the possibility of a new, more dangerous phase in the conflict, should diplomacy fail to contain tensions.

The UN Security Council’s hesitations and de Mistura’s role

Divisions and inaction marked the UN Security Council’s initial response to the restart of the conflict in 2020. The council remained inactive for weeks after the cease-fire collapsed due to deep divisions within its ranks between pro-Polisario (such as Russia among the permanent members, as well as several African and Latin American countries) and pro-Morocco member states (such as France and many Arab and West African governments). Pro-Polisario members wanted the council to publicly put more pressure on Rabat, while pro-Morocco states supported the kingdom’s reluctance to allow any form of international scrutiny of the conflict.

All attempts to push the council to discuss and take a position failed. When Germany requested consultations on the matter in December 2020, Rabat suspended diplomatic ties in retaliation. In April 2021, the United States tried to push the council to take a stance on the need to avoid an escalation and appoint a new UN envoy, but this initiative crashed on a roadblock thrown up by India, which acted on Morocco’s behalf. This move was enough to block the US initiative, as Washington realized that the costs of overcoming New Delhi’s objection would far outweigh the initiative’s benefits.

Faced with a paralyzed Security Council, the Joe Biden administration tried to ease hostilities in Western Sahara. It pushed for the appointment of Staffan de Mistura as the new UN envoy, overcoming Rabat’s initial rejection. Yet, it refrained from clarifying its position on former President Trump’s decision to recognize Moroccan sovereignty over Western Sahara, in an apparent attempt to avoid antagonizing either side.

The Security Council’s divisions and widening gap between Morocco and the Polisario meant that de Mistura had to operate within a very tight policy space. Following the collapse of the cease-fire, the two sides presented diverging views regarding the format and substance of future negotiations. For Rabat, the only way to return to talks was to resume the 2019 roundtable format, which included Algeria, Mauritania, and the Polisario, and to discuss acceptance of its 2007 autonomy plan. The roundtable format was a short-lived negotiating arrangement introduced in 2019 by former UN envoy Horst Kohler, who resigned after only two negotiating sessions for personal reasons, leaving the position vacant until de Mistura’s appointment. The Moroccans view the Polisario as an Algerian proxy and contend that only a grand bargain with Algeria and Mauritania can end the conflict. From its side, the Polisario insists on direct bilateral talks with Morocco to set the terms for a self-determination referendum.

De Mistura embarked on rebuilding ties with regional actors through the use of constructive ambiguity. By prioritizing direct bilateral consultations and keeping a relatively low profile, he gradually expanded his scope of action. His use of the phrasing “all concerned” to avoid precisely describing who should be involved in future negotiations, and invitation to Morocco and the Polisario Front to move beyond their current positions, provided a basis for moving forward. In particular, the “all concerned” language allowed him to sidestep the issue of who should be involved in diplomatic efforts related to Western Sahara by addressing all the parties with a stake in this conflict, whether as direct parties or regional observers. Through such constructive ambiguity, he was able to avoid defining exactly which actors should be involved and which plan should be the basis for negotiations. In October 2022, the Security Council adopted amendments to its annual resolution on Western Sahara that echoed the envoy’s wording, thus providing him with much-needed backing and placing pressure on the parties to engage with him.

Washington’s role 

The Biden administration has started playing a somewhat more assertive role in efforts to revive UN-brokered negotiations. Over the past months, US officials have engaged with all parties involved, aiming to contain regional tensions and rebuild the UN framework for Western Sahara. Washington’s unique position as the only external actor capable of engaging with all stakeholders makes it a critical interlocutor.

Other external actors have struggled to have any impact. France has strengthened its relations with Algeria over the past months, to the detriment of its traditionally close ties with Morocco. Two events in particular contributed to the deterioration. In January 2023, President Emmanuel Macron met with Algerian Chief of Staff Said Chengriha in Paris; and Morocco accused French members of the European Parliament of backing, if not championing, a resolutioncondemning Moroccan violations of press freedom. For its part, in 2022 Spain publicly endorsed the 2007 Moroccan autonomy plan as “the most serious, realistic and credible basis” to solve the conflict, angering the Polisario and Algeria. Germany also expressed its support for the Moroccan plan, having mended its ties with Rabat. And Morocco sees Russia, which is preoccupied with its war in Ukraine, as too close to Algeria’s and the Polisario’s stancesto be a credible mediator.

Despite its privileged position, Washington has been reluctant to invest significant political capital in ending the conflict, considering it a low-priority issue. Instead of applying pressure, the administration has tried to build confidence among all the main stakeholders by leveraging their desire for strong ties with the United States. To this end, the Biden administration has worked to establish closer economic and security ties with Algeria, maintained relations with Morocco, and offered the Polisario the prospect of an expanded diplomatic relationship. But its reluctance to make a bigger push for negotiations could hamper the UN envoy’s efforts. 

Indeed, Morocco has yet to modify its position. Moroccan diplomats continue to engage with the UN envoy, but refuse to abandon the 2019 roundtable format or negotiate beyond their autonomy plan. The Polisario remains open to discussing the envoy’s proposals, but skeptical of the current circumstances for negotiations due to a lack of international attention toward the conflict and a weak negotiating position. 

Israel’s recognition of Moroccan sovereignty over Western Sahara

Despite the temporary lull in tensions, Israel’s recognition of Moroccan sovereignty over Western Sahara has further exacerbated regional tensions. The Moroccan media celebrated the July 17 announcement as another diplomatic victory for the kingdom. The move did not go unchallenged. Three days later, the Algerian Ministry of Foreign Affairs condemned it as “a blatant violation of international law.”

Israel’s step may have bolstered Morocco’s efforts to formalize its control over the territory but is unlikely to inject real momentum in its strategy to secure international support for its claim. International media highlighted how the move strengthens the dominant narrative that Rabat has the upper hand in this conflict, but Israel’s controversial role in the region suggests that few other states will follow its example. 

Supporting a fragile path back to negotiations

The Western Sahara conflict continues to present significant challenges to regional stability, but recent diplomatic efforts offer hope for progress. With some modest backing from the Security Council, de Mistura has managed to open some limited space to pursue a political solution. To ensure that the UN envoy’s efforts to revive talks have any chance of success, Washington should engage more proactively as a relatively impartial broker by extracting concessions from both sides to create a climate more conducive to resuming negotiations. As a first confidence-building step, the United States could ask Rabat to release at least some of the Sahrawi activists who have been detained since protests in Gdeim Izik in 2010 and grant the UN envoy unrestricted access to Moroccan-controlled Western Sahara. On the other side, it should encourage the Polisario to unilaterally suspend its military operations against Morocco. Such steps, if successful, could be enough to lay the basis for a resumption of negotiations.

Riccardo Fabiani is the project director of the North Africa program at the International Crisis Group 

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North Africa is, once again, the theater of local and global challenges, which makes it a highly unstable regional complex. Unresolved crises like the ones in Libya and Western Sahara create obstacles to regional security, economic integration, and peaceful coexistence. The presence and influence of regional players like Turkey, Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates, Israel, and Russia—each having competing interests, priorities, and methods of operation, opens new pathways for conflict and instability. Moreover, the climate crisis is paving the way for additional challenges, with high temperatures soaring across the Mediterranean, scarce crops, and a looming global health crisis. Meanwhile, the number of migrants attempting to reach Europe rose threefold in comparison to this time last year, leaving European countries scurrying to find solutions while maintaining strong ties with North African leaders and standing for human rights—a somewhat impossible task. 

What is in store for the region, and what can global players such as the European Union (EU), the United States, and the African Union do to contain the side effects stemming from crises rising in North Africa?  The US withdrawal from the Middle East has clearly shaped its involvement, or lack thereof, in North Africa. Despite President Joe Biden announcing a more robust US presence in the continent, his feeble attempt to restore the status quo between Algeria and Morocco over Western Sahara is telling a different tale. Meanwhile, the European Union has heavily engaged with Tunisia by signing a memorandum of understanding which aims to stem migration flows while also improving the country’s economic conditions. However, European powers have failed to address the democratic backsliding occurring in the country, which in turn has fueled violence, poverty, and economic uncertainty. The following set of essays, edited by the Atlantic Council’s North Africa Program and the Institute for International Political Studies, seeks to address these challenges and others while also offering concrete recommendations for policymakers. 

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Chiara Lovotti is an ISPI Research Fellow and Scientific Coordinator of “Rome MED-Mediterranean Dialogues”, ISPI’s and the Italian Ministry of Foreign Affairs’ annual flagship event. 

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The region encompassing the Middle East, North Africa, and the Sahel is studded with complex and multi-layered conflicts in which local and international dynamics are closely intertwined. While this may sound like a simple truth, it has important implications for conflict management. Across the region, few wars are strictly intra-state conflicts or are internally resolvable. In most cases, like Libya, Mali, and Yemen, local and regional players, foreign actors, and international organizations have become co-conspirators in these crises’ destinies, argues the newly released report, Conflict Management Models in the MENA Region, authored by Karim Mezran, Chiara Lovotti, Alissa Pavia, Gerald M. Feierstein, Stefano Marcuzzi, and Petr Tůma. These actors often have divergent agendas and are guided by other priorities, pursuing different, sometimes opposing, normative models and pathways to peace.

Countries of the region have witnessed countless attempts to deal with, manage, and resolve conflicts by various actors that have registered mixed fortunes. In Mali, for example, the West had sought a long-term military engagement to mitigate the country’s crisis, whereby European intervention in the Sahel became the laboratory for a joint EU military culture before Russia contributed to the erosion of this exercise, explains the report.

On the other hand, the West’s NATO-led campaign in Libya in 2011 was short-lived and without long-term prospects for peacebuilding, leaving the country fragmented and its institutions in shambles. Other countries, like Russia, have prioritized hardline approaches to conflict management to safeguard domestic priorities. Russian interventionism in the MENA and broader Sahel has witnessed significant military deployments. Yemen is a unique case in point, with bottom-up approaches taking center stage. Civil society actors have recently taken essential steps to mediate the conflict, from negotiating local cease-fire agreements to prisoner exchanges.

Karim Mezran is director of the North Africa Program and resident senior fellow with the Rafik Hariri Center and Middle East Programs at the Atlantic Council focusing on the processes of change in North Africa.

Chiara Lovotti is an ISPI Research Fellow and Scientific Coordinator of “Rome MED-Mediterranean Dialogues”, ISPI’s and the Italian MoFA’s annual flagship event. 

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In 2012, northern Mali was hit by the rebellion of Tuareg separatists, once again seeking the independence of the Azawad, areas inhabited by this Berber-speaking seminomadic people. The National Movement for the Liberation of Azawad (MNLA)—better prepared than in the past with an infusion of arms and personnel flowing from destabilized Libya—quickly seized northern parts of the country. However, the rebellion was soon taken over by Islamists, whose aim wasn’t independence but rather sharia law extending throughout Mali.

As Islamist insurgents were quickly advancing toward central Mali, a military coup in Bamako further weakened the government’s ability to respond. France—upon Mali’s request—decided to intervene. Its counterterrorism operation Serval, building on the successes of earlier French intervention in neighboring Mauretania, managed to stop insurgents’ advance within a few first months of 2013.

In 2014, Serval was transformed into Barkhane operation with a much broader territorial scope, covering the whole Sahel region and headquartered in N’Djamena (Chad). French ambitions went beyond Serval not only territorially, but also in terms of goals and partnership. The counterterrorism focus was progressively paired with state-building elements. At the same time, European countries were gradually stepping in alongside France. There was a “joining” momentum, especially with the 2020 establishment of the counterterrorism Takuba task force, a platform for European special forces to advise and accompany Malians on the battlefield. Europeans also were present in greater numbers within the United Nations Multidimensional Integrated Stabilization Mission in Mali (MINUSMA) and the EU Training Mission.

European momentum in Mali

At the same time, there was growing awareness that there won’t be a sustainable solution without local ownership. Sahel countries, supported by the international community, created the G5 Sahel Joint Force, involving Mauritania, Mali, Burkina Faso, Niger, and Chad. On the other hand, the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS) assumed a leading political role, especially when dealing with the 2020 and 2021 Mali military coups.

Mali became quite crowded and by 2020 the Sahel region contained the largest European military deployment abroad, with around eight thousand troops. Proper coordination among Europeans and other external players became a serious challenge, especially in the field of humanitarian and development aid. The challenge was smaller in the military realm, where there were established coordination formats.

Issues

After Serval’s 2013 successes, when Islamist insurgents were quickly pushed out of urban centers and the French forces were celebrated as liberators, Paris started to face difficulties. Jihadists hid in the mountains or bushes, turned to a hit-and-run approach, and things started to become ugly. This may sound familiar to those who followed US interventions in Afghanistan or Iraq.

Ill-equipped local forces, a UN peacekeeping mission with extremely restrictive rules of engagement, and only a few thousand forces within Barkhane didn’t match with the evolving insurgency, an enemy moving fast over a territory comparable in size to Western Europe.

Malians expected most of the country’s issues to be solved by Europe. The government in Bamako often didn’t cooperate enough, thus becoming part of the problem; sometimes, the government played Europeans and other donors against one another. Europeans had much less leverage on Bamako compared to, say, Americans on the government in Baghdad. The French were not able to make Bamako understand that Barkhane is about stabilization or conflict management, and that the main job should be done by Malians themselves. The result: frustrations on both sides.

French-led efforts to build a European and local coalition of forces seemed to pick up and bring some results, beginning around 2020 with the establishment of the Takuba task force, a reform of the UN MINUSMA mandate, formation of G5 forces, and an enhanced EU training mission.

It was too little, too late. Mali hurt itself with two successive military coups in August 2020 and May 2021. When the junta led by Colonel Assimi Goïta rejected the demands of the international community to stick to the political transition timetable, the relationship with France soured to the point of upending Barkhane’s presence in Mali. There’s a debate as to whether Paris could have behaved a bit more diplomatically in the aftermath of a second coup, handling putschists’ egos and offering them an appropriate off-ramp.

Russian surprise

I had a chance to visit Bamako a few weeks after the second coup in 2021. When asking Western diplomats and local officials about the Russian presence in the country during the last years, they all pointed to Moscow’s rather low profile, compared to Russia’s activities in some other African countries. And yet within a few weeks, Russia suddenly emerged as a major player, exploiting tensions between the new leadership in Bamako and the French (with their European and regional allies). Feeling the pressure from the country’s long-standing partners as they pushed for a political transition, Colonel Goïta opted to remain in power and chose Russia as a partner. In the face of a European intervention that had dragged on for years, was it naive to hope that swapping horses could bring more security? The country’s geopolitical shift added to a sense of the West’s weakening stances in developing nations—parallel to a gradual return of Moscow to the forefront of Middle East and African theaters.

If Russian military intervention in Syria was premeditated, aiming to shore up against a risk of the Assad regime crumbling, Moscow’s coup de main in Bamako was more of a coincidence. As I already hinted in an Atlantic Council blog, even Russia was probably surprised by how easily the deeply rooted French and European influence in the country evaporated by seizing local frustrations, building on European missteps, and introducing disinformation into the mix. Moreover, it all happened at a very low cost, without any major military, economic, or political engagement.

In Mali, Russians reused the playbook from several other African countries (e.g., Central African Republic, Sudan, Mozambique). It just worked better in Mali, due to the circumstances. They prepared the ground through a disinformation campaign; when the opportunity arose (earlier than expected), Moscow offered an alternative to cooperation with the West that was tempting for leaders under pressure. The Russian package typically doesn’t include much economic support: no investments are to be expected. It provides some diplomatic backing, but the core is the protection of the regime, including limited arms supplies/sales, military advisers, and training. Yet, it’s not for free: African leaders are supposed to pay, often through the country’s mineral wealth.

Western sources on the ground told me about a few things Malians seem to appreciate, compared to cooperation with Europeans. Wagner mercenaries, for instance, often accompany local forces (even though Takuba task force troops had tried to do the same). Russians also appear to share more of the actionable information—including drone data on jihadists’ positions—enabling Malians to better operate. Malians and some Europeans complained that the French too often kept military information for themselves. Moscow brought in some arms: even if they were often outdated, the move worked and Malian forces may have felt a bit more confident. On the other hand, Russians often use Malian soldiers as cannon fodder.

Still, Moscow’s priority isn’t the stabilization of the country. Russia is mainly driven by an effort to boost its geopolitical positions, which here means weakening the Europeans. Russia doesn’t even bother coming up with a commensurable substitute to Western state-building projects, whereas China would offer an alternative authoritarian business model. In Mali, Russia appears as an almost pure disrupter. In Syria, Moscow may have interests in stabilizing the country to get its investments back, but Mali isn’t an attractive business project for Russians. It is a landlocked country, with only a few natural resources that are readily exploited. To date, the Wagner Group has been struggling to use concessions for the extraction of minerals. The most lucrative is gold. Yet, there’s too much light around the shining metal and attracting everybody, including Western companies. Shadowy mercenaries thus may be pushed to look for other options such as lithium. Apart from mineral-extraction concessions, the Wagner Group is also supposed to be paid for its services. The Pentagon once estimated that this could be up to $10 million a month. Bamako allegedly already transferred some money, but the greater part is still owed, a European diplomat told me.

The group’s merciless “gloves-off” approach—not caring about civilian damages and sometimes exploring local ethnic grievances—could have brought isolated short-term results. Russians also may have sought to find a modus vivendi with some of the insurgent groups. When you don’t have enough troops on the ground, you should look for a negotiated solution. But that didn’t happen: Russians are simply not up to the challenge. What Islamists really feared were French airstrikes. With those now gone, insurgents are fearlessly rolling on again. US Undersecretary of State Victoria Nuland recently estimated that violence in Mali increased by around 30 percent during the last six months.

Further fragmentation of the country is at risk. As Russians lack the capacity to protect much more than Bamako and mines in the south, Tuaregs may seize control of the north and Islamists expand their rule in the center. So far, Wagner forces are still operating in the center (mainly in the Segou and Mopti regions) and continue to prevent UN peacekeepers from entering some of these areas.

On the way forward to Niger

With about one thousand Wagner mercenaries present on the ground, Moscow cannot succeed where Europe, which had more than eight thousand troops engaged in the region, could not manage even with heavy aerial support. Russia’s ongoing war against Ukraine, which gobbles up military resources, has made containing the insurgency very unlikely. Any drawdown by Wagner in its forces in Mali may not yet be obvious, but it’s believed that the group has significantly decreased recruiting for operations in the Middle East and Africa to better focus on the European battlefield.

As France and its partners withdrew their contingents from Mali, they didn’t give up the fight against the further spread of violence in the Sahel region. Two successive military coups made broader engagement in Burkina Faso a less appealing option, even if the possibility of replaying Mali’s Wagner scenario there now seems rather low. The best harbor appeared to be Niger, where the government is interested in hosting European forces and Moscow has no traditional bearings. Negotiations are already underway between Paris and Niamey on concrete modalities of French and European military presence.

There are lessons that should be learned from Mali. French-led intervention suffered from several flaws, which are addressed in this piece I co-authored. If Paris was driven by the conviction that the solution should be regional and can’t be limited to a counterterrorist operation, then in practice it remained very much French and military centered.

For Niger, this would mean better communication outside and coordination inside. It also would be on the ground, accentuating preventive operations ahead of the proper fight or even more of the responsibility for local partners, once properly trained and equipped. Looking toward Niger, it’s important to underscore that France didn’t lose in Mali against Islamists, but rather because of local politics, its own colonial legacy, and a Russian-led disinformation campaign.

As for Mali, people have to understand what it feels like to be dependent on Russia. And it partly applies to the whole Sahel and Africa, where atrocities that Russia is committing in Ukraine may resonate way less than we, in the West, tend to think. This may take some time. Being a disrupter is easier than building stability. But it’s not a sustainable strategy. It’ll blow out one day.

Within the Malian population and the military, there’s not much opposition against the current leadership and the direction it is steering the country. Major fires have been extinguished. This can change over time once security and economic flaws become more obvious. Still, the first glimpses of such a reckoning may pop up soon as Bamako will have to decide whether to renew the Wagner contract. Since Russia is not delivering, the outcome is not a given.

Petr Tůma is a visiting fellow at the Atlantic Council’s Europe Center. He is a Czech career diplomat with an expertise on Europe, Middle East and transatlantic relations. 

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Conflict-management practices vary in form and structure, depending on the stakes involved and interests that differing parties to the conflict harbor. While, in some cases, conflict management will attempt to account for long-term stability with the involvement of international institutions such as the European Union and the United Nations (Mali), in other cases it will be short lived and with few to no long-term prospects for stability (Libya). Some actors may view the practice of managing conflicts as a way to enable local actors to take ownership over post-conflict reconstruction and rehabilitation (Yemen), while others view the practice as a way to extend their military footprint in the region (Russia).

In Mali, for example, the West has sought a long-term military engagement to mitigate the country’s crisis, which erupted in 2012 after the Tuareg-led separatist rebellion. The French-led counterterrorism operation’s primary goal was to oust the insurgents, while also paving the way for a long-term state-building process to help Mali rebuild after the conflict. European countries and the United Nations also stepped in to provide support and help the French-led intervention. Conflict management was about “stabilization” and, over time, handing over the state-building process to Bamako.

The NATO-led campaign in Libya from 2011, in contrast, had few to no long-term perspectives for stabilization and institution building. Still involved in Afghanistan, NATO member states were keen to avoid a full-fledged military operation in Libya consisting of a strong post-conflict transition and supported by disarmament, demobilization, and reintegration processes. As a result, local Libyan authorities faced the daunting challenge of contrasting the myriad armed groups that emerged because of the war, leaving Libya in shambles and without a centralized government.

Russian interventionism in the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) and the wider Sahel region saw the implementation of a conflict-management strategy that prioritized hard-power approaches over diplomatic, soft-power ones. While Russia narratives have framed its interventions as “peacekeeping missions,” few to no diplomatic efforts have been implemented. The use of widespread force—through military deployments in Syria, Libya, Sudan, Mali, and the Central African Republic—is a case in point of how Russian hard-power strategies prevailed.

Yemen’s crisis witnessed a rather unique management of its conflict, with local women and tribal-led groups taking center stage in the country’s reconstruction plan. By negotiating local ceasefire agreements and prisoner exchanges, civil-society organizations have become protagonists in Yemen’s ongoing civil war. These have provided temporary containment measures to mitigate the consequences of the conflict. However, the process of recovery cannot begin in the absence of a clear path toward ending the conflict and agreeing on a political horizon.

This Atlantic Council-ISPI Dossier focuses on a selected number of conflict case studies (Libya, Yemen, Mali, and Russia) with a view to surface types of mechanisms for dealing with them that have been used by actors including the United Nations, European Union (EU), NATO, and Russia.

Chiara Lovotti is an ISPI Research Fellow and Scientific Coordinator of “Rome MED-Mediterranean Dialogues.”

Alissa Pavia is the Associate Director for the North Africa Program within the Rafik Hariri Center & Middle East Programs at the Atlantic Council. 

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Neutralizing even one of these crises can be confounding and perilous. Some countries, unfortunately, face them all at once, fighting on multiple fronts. That usually keeps them from attending to the longer-term task of giving people the knowledge, skills, access to health care, and opportunities they need to live out their full productive potential. Investing in resilient, shock-responsive systems is critical to protect human-capital gains and improve resilience to future shocks.

Niger is an example of a country that faces many complex and interconnected challenges. Shocks and crises are increasingly frequent and overlapping in Niger, disrupting efforts to sustain broad-based growth, build human capital, and reduce poverty. Regional instability has led to the displacement of families and the closure of schools, threatening social stability and increasing insecurity; that, in turn, complicated Niger’s efforts to respond to the COVID-19 pandemic and worsened the food insecurity that is now affecting more than 4.4 million of the country’s people. Climate shocks have triggered localized flooding, while steady rises in temperatures threaten the more than 80 percent of Niger’s citizens who depend on agriculture for their nourishment and livelihoods.

The government of Niger is determined not to lose any ground in its steady climb to protect and invest in all its citizens by pressing ahead with programs and reforms that are having transformational impact on people’s lives. A great example of this is the Wadata Talaka safety-net program, a partnership between Niger and the World Bank that focuses on poverty reduction, resilience building, and women’s empowerment. The program provides monthly cash transfers to extremely poor households to smooth their consumption expenditures and improve their ability to cope with shocks. It also provides “economic inclusion” support—life and micro-entrepreneurship skills training, coaching, and support to village savings groups—and helps poor children get essential mental stimulation in their early years. Such programs can respond quickly to help poor and vulnerable families prepare for, cope with, and adapt to shocks such as the COVID-19 pandemic: As the virus spread, the program expanded to four hundred thousand households to protect them from the pandemic’s adverse economic consequences. The program is well-placed to assist poor households with rising food insecurity and climate shocks.

A successful response will need to include supporting women and innovation. Because women are the primary beneficiaries of Wadata Talaka, the program is an important vehicle for their empowerment. Evaluations of the economic inclusion program show that in the eighteen months since it began, it improved household consumption and food security. The total income of women beneficiaries has increased (by 60 to 100 percent, much of it from non-farm businesses), and there is strong evidence of gains in their mental health and social wellbeing.

To develop such systems reaching the poorest and most vulnerable, countries will need strong social registries and good enrollment, delivery, and payment systems, often leveraging technology. The government of Niger is fully committed to these efforts. For example, responding to climate change, Wadata Talaka was the first program of its kind in West Africa to use satellite data to quickly anticipate drought hotspots and provide emergency funds more quickly than usual (three months ahead of the traditional response) to help people before they entered the lean season. Research is currently underway to measure the impact of that speed.

At a time when countries are forced to contend with the ebb and flow of shocks like climate change, pandemics, conflict, or food price increases, investments in social protection systems are more critical than ever. Niger’s programs serve as an example of just how impactful such adaptive systems can be.

Ouhoumoudou Mahamadou is the prime minister of Niger.

Mamta Murthi is vice president for human development at the World Bank.

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Introduction

Non-state armed groups (NSAGs) pose a thorny policy dilemma for US and European officials trying to stabilize fragile states.¹ NSAGs are far from homogenous in their motivations, tactics, and structure, resulting in highly varied roles in either perpetrating or mitigating violence, with many playing a part in both. On one side, NSAGs can create instability by using violence to advance a range of interests, from political influence and financial gain to challenging a central government’s legitimacy or territorial control. Many NSAGs are directly responsible for civilian harm, including perpetrating targeted violence, persecuting, killing and committing brutal abuses against citizens.² There is no shortage of examples of NSAGs that fit this mold. From Boko Haram in Northeast Nigeria to Katibat Macina in Mali, armed groups have wreaked havoc on the lives of civilians as well as US and European security interests.

In other contexts, however, the picture is not as clear-cut. Some armed groups play a role in maintaining security and protecting citizens from other violent actors, including the state. NSAGs can also provide services, collect taxes, resolve disputes, and establish governance systems in areas where they exercise control. The pandemic has shed light on how the governing authority of NSAGs can be utilized to manage the spread of COVID-19: for example, in Myanmar, non-state armed groups established health checks and restricted travel.³ Depending on the various roles they play in a community, such actors may be viewed as locally legitimate in the eyes of the population. NSAGs, even those with a history of using coercive power, can fill a governance gap and might be the only viable partner for the government and its international supporters trying to stabilize a conflict-affected area.

The dual nature of NSAGs poses the problem of whether, and how, the host government, the United States, and European powers should cooperate with NSAGs as part of a broader stabilization strategy. Critically, NSAGs proliferate in contexts where the social contract between the state and its citizens is broken (or nonexistent). Yet, many stabilization strategies are predicated on the assumption that NSAGs will ultimately be incorporated into political structures, which, by nature, may be corrupt and captured by elites who are more interested in holding power rather than moving toward a democratic system. This presents particular challenges for stakeholders aiming to promote sustainable peace and stability.

This policy conundrum is particularly pronounced in the Sahel.⁴ Across this conflict-ridden region, a range of NSAGs—from armed groups holding political motivations and self-defense militias to violent extremist organizations (VEOs)—operate with wide license to advance their interests and have caused conflict rates to skyrocket. In 2021, the Sahel experienced a 70 percent increase in violent incidents carried out by militant Islamist groups (from 1,180 to 2,005 events), just one type of NSAG common to the region, over the previous year.⁵

But NSAGs are not a conflict-producing scourge everywhere in the Sahel. In some locales where the government—nationally or locally—is weak, corrupt, perceived as illegitimate, or all three, NSAGs often fill a governance void or, at minimum, provide essential services. Witness the Koglweogo in Burkina Faso, which enjoy legitimacy in the eyes of local populations. These “Guardians of the Bush” formed to offset the central government’s inability to quell violent extremist organizations (VEOs), and in some areas provide forms of judicial governance. To the north, in Mali, self-defense groups are common in large swathes of the country. And in Niger, the Izala movement provides security and other forms of governance. These groups are not without their problems. However, the Sahel often offers no easy options for engagement. Solutions will come with difficult trade-offs. Any stabilization approach must account for the legitimacy these groups hold and explore means for engagement, if not outright collaboration or support.

Recognizing this challenge, policy makers on both sides of the Atlantic have augmented efforts to understand how NSAGs operate and develop evidence-based approaches to mitigate risks stemming from them. They have done so to confront the NSAG problem generally and for the Sahel specifically. Despite this more concerted focus, however, Washington and its transatlantic allies must do more to enhance their approaches—alone and together. 

This policy brief examines how transatlantic cooperation regarding NSAGs can be strengthened. It begins by describing the proliferation of NSAGs generally and the threat they pose to stability in the Sahel specifically. It then explores US and European policies toward engaging NSAGs, highlighting how these frameworks remain underdeveloped on both sides of the Atlantic—and pointing to opportunities for greater coordination. With this overview of the challenge in place, the brief pivots to outlining a three-part solution. The first is a set of criteria the United States and Europe can use to determine which groups are acceptable to engage—generally and as partners in stabilization specifically. This is a thorny policy dilemma but a thicket allies must work through if they are to stabilize key areas of the Sahel. The second is an approach for burden-sharing by establishing a set of common objectives for transatlantic cooperation. The third includes practical options for policy development and parameters for dealing with NSAGs generally and in the Sahel specifically.

The framework is rooted in the principles of the “strategic empowerment” approach to stabilization, which involves supporting local actors that exercise governing authority in a citizen-centric manner and align with U.S. values and standards. ⁶

Fragile states offer no optimal solutions, but strategic empowerment is the best available option and well suited for the increasingly contested nature of stabilization. “Contested stabilization” is defined as “situations where international actors pursue their own contradictory strategic objectives in a fragile or conflict-affected state. It is the stabilization corollary to a proxy war: Actors engage in stabilization activities—diplomacy and other assistance, to empower local actors and systems they can influence—with the aim of improving their own core interests, gaining access to emerging markets or resources, antagonizing adversaries, and expanding their perceived sphere of influence.” ⁷

Fellow

Patrick Quirk

Nonresident Senior Fellow

Freedom and Prosperity Center Scowcroft Center for Strategy and Security

Civil Society Conflict

The Transatlantic Security Initiative, in the Scowcroft Center for Strategy and Security, shapes and influences the debate on the greatest security challenges facing the North Atlantic Alliance and its key partners.

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NATO leaders are finally focusing on human security, a major step toward a broader vision of crisis management.

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The post Toward a framework for transatlantic cooperation on non-state armed groups appeared first on Atlantic Council.

On March 22, Aude Darnal participated in a panel discussion on the future of the Sahel and Western military assistance in Africa. She advocated for reforming US security sector assistance, a redirection of funding from DoD to DoS, and greater emphasis on supporting locally-led long-term security sector governance and civilian-led initiatives aiming to prevent violent conflict.

“If we go back to the past two years or past decades, there are a number of coup leaders that had been trained by US military forces. This is not to say that military assistance directly favors coups, but because of the body of evidence and literature, it deserves more scrutiny when assessing the efficiency and adequacy of the security sector programs.” Darnal argued that multiple coup leaders were trained via the United States, despite US security sector assistance programs claiming to promote human rights and civilian oversight of military institutions, showing the severe limitations of military assistance.

More about our expert

Former staff

Aude Darnal

New American Engagement Initiative Scowcroft Center for Strategy and Security

Africa Conflict

The post Darnal at the Chicago Council: The Sahel and Western military assistance in Africa appeared first on Atlantic Council.

To read the English version of this report, click here.
Un enregistrement du lancement de rapport est disponible ici.

La donne démographique dans la région et ses retombées à l’horizon de 2045 2045

Le Sahel – soit, dans le cadre de cette étude, la région au sud du Sahara qui s’étend du Sénégal au Tchad en y incluant les douze états septentrionaux de la Fédération nigériane appliquant la charia — est dans une impasse démographique. Loin de produire un « dividende », la croissance rapide d’une population dont le profil d’âge est très jeune et dont le taux de fécondité reste très élevé submerge la capacité des états à produire des biens publics en quantité nécessaire. Cette donne démographique ralentit, voire bloque la croissance économique ; elle limite le progrès social et obère l’urbanisation par l’extension des bidonvilles. Au fil des décennies, ces conditions, qui se renforcent mutuellement, ont sapé la légitimité des gouvernements centraux et rendu les états de la région vulnérables à la propagation d’un populisme islamique radical et, plus généralement, à l’instabilité.

La période 2040-2045 est l’horizon temps de cette étude. D’ici à là, du fait du profil d’âge très jeune de leurs populations (quatre sur dix Sahéliens ont moins de quinze ans), les états de la région devront se doter de nouvelles infrastructures, augmenter la productivité agricole et élargir le marché du travail de façon à pouvoir répondre aux besoins pressants de cohortes de jeunes adultes toujours plus nombreuses qui, d’année en année, rivaliseront pour des emplois rémunérateurs au sein d’une main d’œuvre déjà largement sous-employée. En même temps, les gouvernements devront maintenir la sécurité collective. Leurs efforts pour y parvenir, quand bien même ils seraient sous-tendus par la meilleure volonté et une parfaite expertise, ne pourront s’approcher de leurs objectifs qu’à condition de s’attaquer en priorité à l’entrave majeure au développement, à savoir les taux de fertilité persistant à des niveaux très élevés.

S’ils veulent sortir de l’impasse actuelle, les gouvernements sahéliens devront réorienter une partie importante de leurs efforts de développement et moyens financiers vers des politiques et programmes visant à améliorer la condition féminine : en prévenant les mariages et grossesses précoces chez les adolescentes, en promouvant l’éducation des filles et en garantissant la pleine participation des femmes dans tous les secteurs publics et privés, à commencer par les lieux de travail. Car l’amélioration tous azimuts de la condition féminine est la condition sine qua non pour l’avènement de familles de taille plus réduite et aux membres mieux instruits. Or, l’insurrection djihadiste dans la région complique la mise en œuvre, en toute sécurité, de programmes promouvant les femmes, du moins en dehors des grandes villes sous le contrôle des gouvernements ; elle comporte aussi le risque que les bailleurs de fonds extérieurs du développement, notamment l’Union européenne et les États-Unis, se désengagent de la région pour ne plus chercher qu’à contenir de l’extérieur — à l’instar de ce qu’ils font déjà en Somalie — la menace djihadiste et la pression migratoire montante au Sahel.

Un forum de débat associé : perspectives politiques et projets régionaux

Pour prolonger Bette étude et ouvrir le débat à d’autres expertises, initiatives et projets menés dans le Sahel, le Conseil Atlantique a demandé à l’ONG américaine Organizing to Advance Solutions in the Sahel (OASIS), dédiée à l’accélération de la transition démographique dans la région, d’inviter à collaborer des experts ouest-africains en santé publique et en éducation. Dans une série de débats organisés à cette fin, ces professionnels ont confronté leurs idées quant aux mérites des approches politiques actuelles et des projets en cours dans la région, ainsi que des obstacles rencontrés et de leurs recommandations en la matière. Sous le titre « Accélérer la transition démographique », le synopsis de ces consultations est accessible ici. Par ailleurs, une note d’accompagnement d’OASIS dresse le tableau de l’aide internationale en matière de santé reproductive et pour l’éducation des filles dans le Sahel. La version intégrale de cette note, dont les principales informations ont été intégrées dans la présente étude, peut être consultée via le lien que voici.

Les résultats en un coup d’œil

Le profil d’âge d’une population et la « fenêtre démographique ». Pris dans leur ensemble, les pays du Sahel abritent parmi les populations les plus jeunes du monde. Qui plus est, selon la projection moyenne de fécondité de la Division de la population des Nations Unies (ONU), aucun pays sahélien ne devrait atteindre au cours des vingt à vingt-cinq années à venir — soit la période couverte par le présent rapport — la « fenêtre démographique », c’est-à-dire une période propice à la croissance économique et au développement du fait d’un profil d’âge favorable de la population (on parle à ce propos aussi de « dividende démographique »). Au cours des soixante-dix dernières années, c’est dans cette « fenêtre » — qui s’ouvre à partir d’un âge médian d’une population entre 25 et 26 ans — que d’autres pays ont généralement atteint des niveaux de développement moyens supérieurs (correspondant à cette catégorie de revenus, telle que définie par la Banque mondiale, et les niveaux plus élevés d’éducation et de survie des enfants qui y sont associés). D’ici à 2045, seuls la Mauritanie et le Sénégal s’approcheront de cette « fenêtre démographique », à en croire la projection actuelle de l’ONU à faible taux de fécondité — le scénario le plus optimiste de la série standard de la Division de la Population.

La croissance démographique. Les démographes de l’ONU estiment que la population totale des six états du Sahel est passée de près de 21 millions d’habitants, en 1960, à environ 103 millions en 2020, soit presque un quintuplement en soixante ans. Pour le nord du Nigéria, leurs estimations aboutissent à une trajectoire de croissance similaire, avec près de 78 millions d’habitants en 2020. Les populations combinées des six pays du Sahel et du nord du Nigéria devraient ainsi passer de l’estimation actuelle — 181 millions d’habitants — à une fourchette comprise entre 370 millions et 415 millions d’habitants en 2045. Une grande partie de cette croissance sera le résultat de l’actuel profil d’âge très jeune de ces populations et de l’élan démographique qui en résulte (en anglais, on parle à ce propos de age-structural momentum ou population momentum).

La baisse de la fécondité. Les taux globaux de fécondité de la région varient actuellement entre 4,6 enfants par femme au Sénégal et en Mauritanie et des taux de pré-transition démographique — plus de 6,5 enfants par femme — au Niger et dans les douze états du nord du Nigéria. Dans tout le Sahel, les taux de procréation chez les adolescentes restent extrêmement élevés, et la taille de la famille perçue comme étant « idéale » est généralement égale ou supérieure à la fécondité réalisée. Dans le passé, jusqu’aux séries de données de l’ONU en 2010, les projections de baisse de fécondité de la Division de la Population pour les pays du Sahel se sont toujours avérées trop optimistes. Cependant, des enquêtes locales plus récentes indiquent que la version actuelle de sa projection de fécondité moyenne n’est pas hors de portée. Ce scénario prédit qu’entre 2040 et 2045 la fécondité diminuera pour atteindre entre 4 et 3,4 enfants par femme dans la plupart des états du Sahel, et près de 4,7 au Niger. Il y a déjà des écarts significatifs dans l’utilisation de contraceptifs modernes et entre les modèles de procréation chez les femmes rurales au Sahel et les femmes urbaines plus instruites. Mais ces différences ne sont pas encore aussi prononcées qu’en Afrique de l’Est ou en Afrique australe, où la baisse de la fécondité est plus avancée et se poursuit à un rythme plus rapide.

La santé maternelle et infantile, ainsi que l’éducation des filles. Alors que la mortalité infantile a constamment diminué au Sahel, un enfant sur dix meurt encore avant l’âge de cinq ans au Mali et au Tchad. Par ailleurs, selon des estimations récentes de l’Organisation mondiale de la santé (OMS), plus de 40 pour cent des enfants de moins de cinq ans présentent un retard de croissance au Niger et au Tchad. Toujours selon l’OMS, le taux de mortalité maternelle au Tchad est le deuxième plus élevé du monde, tandis que la Mauritanie, le Mali et le Niger figurent parmi les vingt pays de la planète où la grossesse et l’accouchement sont les plus dangereux. Au Tchad et au Niger, seule une fille sur cinq en âge de l’être est en réalité inscrite dans un établissement d’enseignement secondaire ; ailleurs dans la région, le taux net de scolarisation des filles ne dépasse pas 40 pour cent dans le secondaire. Partout, les mariages d’adolescentes restent le principal obstacle à l’augmentation de leur niveau d’éducation.

L’autonomie et les droits des femmes. En dépit des conseils prodigués par des professionnels locaux de la santé et les exhortations des agences de l’ONU, les gouvernements sahéliens successifs n’ont, jusqu’à présent, pris aucune disposition effective pour faire appliquer les lois déjà existantes qui permettraient de réduire les mariages d’adolescentes, d’éliminer l’excision, de protéger les femmes contre les mariages forcés, de restreindre la polygamie ou, encore, de donner aux femmes des droits égaux de succession et la garde de leurs enfants en cas de séparation conjugale ou de veuvage. Alors que les défenseurs des droits des femmes considèrent que ces mesures sont indispensables pour faire évoluer les préférences vers des familles plus restreintes et mieux éduquées, les dirigeants craignent un retour de flamme politique. L’ampleur de la résistance organisée — comme, par exemple, lors des manifestations d’organisations islamiques au Mali en 2009, qui ont fait reculer les droits des femmes — a même convaincu certains professionnels du développement que, dans plusieurs états du Sahel, la seule voie de changement actuellement ouverte passe, à moyen terme, par un soutien financier accru à l’éducation des filles, aux réseaux des soins de santé pour les femmes et aux organisations de la société civile qui luttent pour l’égalité des femmes.

L’agriculture. Malgré le changement climatique, la hausse des températures locales et le récent ralentissement de l’expansion des terres cultivées, la croissance de la production céréalière a, depuis 1990, dépassé le rythme de la croissance démographique dans la région, qui est de l’ordre de 3 pour cent par an. Cependant, en raison de récoltes erratiques sur des terres exploitées de façon peu productive, de conflits armés et d’un grand nombre de personnes déplacées, les états de la région sont restés tributaires d’une aide alimentaire importante. Alors que l’irrigation par les eaux souterraines est susceptible de prendre de l’ampleur, les effets combinés de la croissance démographique future, du réchauffement climatique continu, de l’insurrection persistante et de la sécheresse périodique dans le Sahel rendent l’autosuffisance alimentaire très improbable dans un avenir prévisible.

Le pastoralisme. Après trois décennies d’augmentation relativement régulière des précipitations dans certaines parties de la région, le nombre de têtes de bétail (ajusté en fonction des différences de taille des espèces) a considérablement augmenté depuis les années 1990. Pourtant, les zones de pâturage les plus productives ont diminué parce qu’elles ont aussi été mises à contribution par des populations croissantes d’agriculteurs dans les zones plus arides. En même temps, le nombre des détenteurs de droits de pâturage a été multiplié et la végétation des zones convoitées s’est sensiblement dégradée, au point où la moins bonne qualité du fourrage a précipité le passage des bovins aux moutons et aux chèvres. Dans tout le Sahel, les agro-écologistes ont noté l’émergence de ce qu’ils appellent des systèmes de production « néo-pastoraux », lesquels se caractérisent par de riches propriétaires de grands troupeaux absents du terrain, la prolifération d’armes légères mais sophistiquées et, sur place, une sous-classe pastorale paupérisée et politiquement marginalisée qui est de plus en plus vulnérable à la radicalisation.

La sécurité. Depuis 2009, le Sahel fait face à des insurrections islamistes en pleine expansion. Cette tendance est susceptible de s’aggraver étant donné qu’aucun état de la région ne devrait atteindre, d’ici à 2045, la « fenêtre démographique » qui, selon les modèles fondés sur l’analyse du profil d’âge d’une population, inaugure une baisse substantielle du risque de conflits non-territoriaux (ou révolutionnaires) persistants. D’après ces modèles, les conflits en cours au Mali, Burkina Faso et Niger, ainsi qu’au Tchad et dans le nord du Nigéria sont ainsi statistiquement susceptibles de se poursuivre, à un certain niveau, pendant les vingt-cinq années à venir. Ce qui retardera d’autant l’amélioration de la condition féminine dans la mesure où, contrairement aux insurrections d’inspiration marxiste dans l’Asie du Sud-Est et en Amérique latine au cours de la seconde moitié du XXe siècle, la présence djihadiste dans les zones rurales du Sahel limite les progrès de l’éducation des femmes, leur autonomie et la fourniture de services de planification familiale..

L’urbanisation. Dans les six pays francophones du Sahel, la population urbaine — en croissance rapide — représente actuellement environ un tiers de la population et devrait s’approcher de la moitié d’ici à 2045. Les investissements dans le logement ont permis de réduire sensiblement la proportion des personnes vivant dans des bidonvilles, mais ces efforts ont été dépassés par une croissance urbaine telle qu’en chiffres absolus, la population des bidonvilles dans la région a presque doublé depuis 1990. À mesure que les opportunités génératrices de revenus se font rares dans les secteurs de l’agriculture et de l’élevage, les espoirs des hommes jeunes reposent sur le marché du travail urbain et les possibilités d’éducation susceptibles de les rendre aptes à l’emploi. Toutefois, l’emploi dans le secteur formel de l’économie demeurera l’exception rare dans la région, et l’urbanisation rapide continue ne manquera pas de poser de nouveaux problèmes de logement, d’accès à l’eau potable et à l’énergie, d’assainissement, de santé publique et de sécurité. Pour relever ces défis, les gouvernements locaux et les bailleurs de fonds étrangers devraient investir massivement dans l’aménagement urbain afin de stimuler les transitions vers une plus grande autonomie des femmes et vers des familles plus réduites, mieux nourries et mieux éduquées. Ce faisant, ils ouvriraient aussi de meilleures perspectives pour trouver un emploi en ville.

La migration. Entre 1990 et 2015, plus de 80 pour cent des flux migratoires à partir des six pays francophones du Sahel ont abouti au-delà des frontières de la région. Au cours de cette période, six migrants sur dix ayant quitté le Sahel se sont installés ailleurs en Afrique, alors que les quatre autres sont partis en Europe, en Amérique du Nord ou vers d’autres destinations. Le Sénégal et le Nigéria ont été les principales portes de sortie vers l’Europe et l’Amérique du Nord. À ces flux migratoires se sont ajoutés, dans la période 2015-2020, d’importants flux de réfugiés du fait de l’escalade des conflits dans le bassin du lac Tchad ainsi qu’au Mali, Niger et Burkina Faso. Pour les jeunes Sahéliens réduits à la précarité aussi bien dans les zones rurales pratiquant l’agriculture de subsistance que dans des bidonvilles, la sécheresse épisodique, les conflits persistants et les difficultés économiques durables représentent des facteurs d’incitation au départ. Dans cette partie aride et peu développée du monde, la taille de la population est importante au regard des ressources disponibles — d’où une pénurie de facteurs d’attraction pour rester sur place. La croissance démographique ne cesse de grossir les rangs des personnes dont les moyens de subsistance sont marginaux et qui pourraient être poussées à partir en cas de désastres naturels ou politiques pour aller chercher de meilleures opportunités ailleurs.

Modèles d’une transition accélérée

Ce rapport met en exergue les voices empruntées par trois états qui, par des politiques et programmes non-coercitifs, ont réussi à accélérer leur transition démographique en baissant leur taux de fécondité et en transformant le profil d’âge de leurs populations: la Tunisie, le Botswana et le Bangladesh. Bien que ces pays diffèrent géographiquement, culturellement et économiquement des pays sahéliens, les points de départ démographiques étaient similaires et sont comparables avec la situation actuelle dans les pays sahéliens. En effet, dans les trois états cités en exemple, l’âge médian de la population était inférieur à vingt ans (ce qui correspond à une pyramide d’âge très élargie à la base) et l’indicateur synthétique de fécondité se situait entre six et sept enfants par femme. Par ailleurs, mention est également faite des politiques et programmes en cours pour changer la donne démographique en Éthiopie, au Rwanda, au Kenya et au Malawi.

La Tunisie. Dans ce pays d’Afrique du Nord, la sortie accélérée de la transition démographique doit beau- coup au leadership inspiré de Habib Bourguiba, le pre- mier président de la Tunisie. Il a fait passer un ensemble de réformes favorables aux femmes, notamment des lois obligeant les parents à envoyer leurs filles à l’école, relevant l’âge légal du mariage, interdisant le port du voile et la polygamie, réduisant le pouvoir des imams locaux, autorisant les femmes à travailler en dehors de leur foyer, leur donnant plein droit à l’héritage, faisant du divorce un processus judiciaire et mettant en place dans tout le pays des centres de planification familiale volontaire.

Botswana. D’emblée, le professionnalisme des soins mis à disposition et leur coût abordable ont été les éléments-clés de l’effort de ce pays en matière de santé reproductive. Proposés gratuitement depuis 1970, les services de planification familiale ont été intégrés aux soins de santé maternelle et infantile dans tous les établissements de santé primaire locaux. En outre, le Botswana est l’un des rares pays d’Afrique subsaharienne où le taux de scolarisation des filles dans l’enseignement secondaire dépasse celui des garçons. Le Botswana a partagé avec les pays du Sahel le défi initial des taux élevés de mariages et de grossesses précoces. Mais sa bonne gouvernance et son utilisation judicieuse de ses rentes minières (diamantifère, notamment) le distingue de la plupart des pays du continent.

Le Bangladesh. La remarquable transformation démographique de ce pays est due à une administration sanitaire dévouée. Celle-ci a su mobiliser des dizaines de milliers d’agents de santé communautaires et de bénévoles en faisant équipe avec une organisation non-gouvernementale locale, le Comité pour le Progrès Rural au Bangladesh (BRAC). Elle a également utilisé à bon escient les fonds d’aide et les produits de santé apportés par les donateurs étrangers. Lancée en 1975, cette approche, soutenue par une campagne de communication en matière de santé publique à l’échelle du pays, a contribué à déclencher la demande de nouvelles méthodes de contraception à long terme (par exemple, des injectables et des implants), l’élargissement au niveau national du programme des travailleurs de village et la mise en place d’une chaîne d’approvisionnement en matière de santé publique.

Programmes ailleurs en Afrique. Forts du soutien de leurs dirigeants politiques et en s’inspirant des expériences en Asie et en Amérique latine, les programmes de santé reproductive en Éthiopie, au Rwanda, au Kenya et au Malawi ont gagné une grande visibilité et des soutiens importants de la part des bailleurs de fonds étrangers. Au cours des trois dernières décennies, une meilleure attention prêtée à l’éducation des filles, les efforts organisés pour accroître les droits des femmes en matière de procréation et leur participation politique, de même qu’une communication efficace en matière de santé publique, ont amélioré l’efficacité de ces programmes ciblant, à la fois, la santé maternelle et infantile ainsi que la planification familiale. Toutefois, d’importants problèmes de prestation de services et d’acceptation des contraceptifs modernes subsistent dans chacun de ces pays où les taux d’abandon de la contraception sont élevés et les écarts dans l’utilisation des contraceptifs restent grands entre les ménages ruraux à faible revenu et les familles urbaines plus riches.

Scénarios

Dans des situations de crise et d’incertitude, bâtir des scénarios d’avenir aide à réduire le champ des possibles et à déceler des éventualités peu visibles qui pourraient prendre les décideurs au dépourvu. Ces futurs fictifs permettent aux analystes de s’écarter des trajectoires d’événements les plus attendus et d’explorer d’autres possibilités sans avoir à imaginer des discontinuités ou à expliquer des enchaînements d’événements complexes qui, au cours de l’histoire, ont parfois conduit à des surprises. Dans un souci didactique de concision, notre étude présentera les trois scénarios suivants sous la forme de dépêches d’agence de presse (évidemment fictives mais plausibles), des coups de projecteur sur la situation du Sahel au début des années 2040

Du pareil au même. Lors d’un sommet interrégional tenu en 2043, l’Union Européenne (UE) et l’organisation des états sahéliens conviennent d’une nouvelle convention quinquennale sur la migration. L’accord contrôle et limite les flux de migrants en provenance et à travers le Sahel en échange d’une forte augmentation de l’aide financière de l’UE à la région. Ce scénario repose sur l’hypothèse que les inscriptions des filles à l’école ont continué à augmenter dans le Sahel et que l’utilisation de contraceptifs modernes y a lentement progressé en s’étendant des zones urbaines en plein essor aux villes de province, puis dans les villages. Cependant, les gouvernements n’ont guère mené d’actions soutenues pour renforcer les droits des femmes ou atténuer l’ordre patriarcal, qui tolère, entre autres, les mariages et grossesses précoces. En même temps, au nom d’une gouvernance islamique, les états du Sahel ont institué des compléments de revenu en espèces pour les mères à la maison, à la fois pour maintenir les femmes au foyer et pour leur offrir une relative indépendance financière. Par ailleurs, ces états ont mis en commun leurs ressources militaires afin de mieux contenir les groupes djihadistes, qui sont restés actifs, notamment, dans les zones rurales du Sahel.

La percée. Également en 2043, un sommet des états sahéliens regroupés au sein du G7 Sahel débat, sur la base d’un rapport parrainé par l’ONU, du retour- nement de situation en matière de santé reproductive dans plusieurs de ses pays membres et des progrès significatifs enregistrés dans d’autres. Un représentant local du Fonds des Nations Unies pour la Population (UNFPA) présente les résultats d’une grande enquête démographique et sanitaire. Il en ressort qu’au Sénégal et au Burkina Faso, l’indicateur synthétique de fécondité est passé sous la barre des trois enfants par femme, et que même le Niger semble emboîter le pas à la région dans sa marche vers une baisse de la fécondité. Des enquêtes locales menées dans plusieurs grandes villes du Sahel révèlent que la fécondité y est déjà proche du seuil de remplacement de deux enfants par femme et que l’afflux dans les maternités, ainsi que la taille des classes d’école, ont considérablement diminué. Mais, du fait de l’accroissement continu de la population (dû à l’élan démographique qui résulte de son profil d’âge très jeune), de la hausse des températures, de mauvaises récoltes périodiques et de la violence sporadique des djihadistes, les importations de céréales et l’aide alimentaire restent des éléments essentiels pour la sécurité alimentaire au Sahel.

Le décrochage. Lors d’une session du Conseil de sécurité de l’ONU en 2043, le Représentant spécial pour le Sahel du Secrétaire général appelle à une action internationale d’urgence pour faire face à une crise multiforme dans la région. Il décrit la faillite de plusieurs états sahéliens et les luttes territoriales entre seigneurs de la guerre. Il cite notamment la détérioration des conditions de sécurité dans le pays haoussa tant au Nigéria qu’au Niger, où des groupes djihadistes prophétiques ont proliféré et, dans certains cas, assis leur autorité politique. Il relève également que les aérodromes dans le Sahel sont devenus des plaques tournantes pour toutes sortes de trafics, y compris d’êtres humains. Il interpelle le Conseil de sécurité au sujet du Niger en proie à une famine d’une ampleur comparable à celle, catastrophique, du début des années 1980. Or, cette fois, ce pays doit nourrir une population de près de soixante millions d’habitants, au lieu des 7 millions à l’époque. Ce défi est d’autant plus grand que la porte d’entrée régionale qu’est le Sénégal pour l’aide alimentaire et d’autres formes d’assistance humanitaire est tout juste entr’ouverte, le gouvernement sénégalais n’étant guère coopératif, pas plus pour l’acheminement de secours que dans la lutte contre la migration illégale vers l’Europe.

Recommandations

Pour les donators d’aide internationale au Sahel, cette étude contient une recommandation d’ordre général: au cours des vingt à vingt-cinq années à venir, les transitions démographiques dans la région devraient comporter au moins une ou deux réussites exemplaires pouvant servir de réservoir d’expertise locale et de modèles pour la mobilisation communautaire susceptibles de se propager ailleurs. Le Sénégal semble être le meilleur candidat à l’accueil d’un tel effort concerté. Parmi les pays enclavés du Sahel, c’est peut-être encore le cas du Burkina Faso, à condition que ses zones rurales retrouvent paix et sécurité. Au Niger, au Mali et au Tchad, les interventions les plus efficaces seront sans doute celles qui améliorent la situation des femmes, développent à grande échelle les infrastructures dans les villes et forment des agents de santé suffisamment dévoués pour qu’ils acceptent de travailler dans les périphéries urbaines et les camps de réfugiés où les demandes d’éducation, de planification familiale et d’autres services de santé reproductive sont généralement élevées. Voici aussi les recommandations plus spécifiques de notre étude:

Mettre à profit l’urbanisation. Les gouvernements de la région devront redoubler d’efforts pour améliorer le niveau d’éduca- tion des filles et, avec le concours des bailleurs de fonds étrangers, augmenter considérablement les dépenses consacrées à la planning familial et aux autres services de santé reproductive. Ils devront par ailleurs élever le statut administratif de la planification familiale au rang de responsabilité ministérielle et renforcer sa visibil- ité par des campagnes d’information. De surcroît, les administrations chargées de l’éducation nationale et Dans ces villes en expansion, il sera également impératif que l’éducation des filles et la planification familiale sur une base volontaire, ainsi que des services de santé maternelle et infantile, se mettent en place, et que les femmes y aient un accès de plein droit aux emplois, tant dans le secteur privé que public.

Renforcer l’éducation des filles et la planification familiale. Les gouvernements de la région devront redoubler d’efforts pour améliorer le niveau d’éduca- tion des filles et, avec le concours des bailleurs de fonds étrangers, augmenter considérablement les dépenses consacrées à la planning familial et aux autres services de santé reproductive. Ils devront par ailleurs élever le statut administratif de la planification familiale au rang de responsabilité ministérielle et renforcer sa visibil- ité par des campagnes d’information. De surcroît, les administrations chargées de l’éducation nationale et de la santé publique devraient éliminer les obstacles bureaucratiques, traditionnels et religieux à la scolarisa- tion des filles et permettre un accès facile et abordable aux services de planification familiale aux personnes mariées aussi bien que célibataires. La mise à dispo- sition de ces services devrait être décentralisée pour être accessible dans les quartiers urbains comme dans les foyers ruraux ; à ce titre, des agents de santé villa- geois et des cliniques mobiles paraissent particulière- ment bien adaptés aux conditions sahéliennes. Il serait également utile que des organisations professionnelles de la santé créent une bibliothèque en ligne pour ren- dre accessibles des exemples de réussite locales dans les domaines de l’éducation des filles — leur éducation sexuelle et en matière de santé reproductive — et du planning familial.

Travailler avec des chefs religieux et politiques, ainsi que d’autres personnalités publiques; impliquer et informer les hommes. L’utilisation plus générale de contraceptifs modernes est souvent liée à des prises de position publiques de la part de chefs religieux, qui jugent le planning familial compatible avec la foi. Par ailleurs, des études récentes accréditent l’idée que les programmes qui informent et impliquent les hommes et s’appuient sur le soutien de dirigeants locaux ont les plus grandes chances de réussite dans le Sahel. Enfin, depuis des décennies, les communicants de la santé y travaillent déjà avec des producteurs de télévision et de radio, ainsi qu’avec des artistes — en particulier des acteurs connus de feuilletons ou talk-shows populaires — pour mieux diffuser des messages de service public concernant la santé maternelle et infantile, la nutrition, l’éducation sexuelle, le VIH/Sida, les droits des femmes ou le planning familial.

Renforcer les droits des femmes. Dans le Sahel, de grands progrès peuvent être accomplis en protégeant les filles et les femmes contre de multiples formes de discrimination et de violence, et en renforçant leurs droits dans le cadre du mariage. Cet effort commence par l’application des lois nationales déjà existantes, qui interdisent l’excision, les mariages forcés et le mariage précoce, avant l’âge de dix-huit ans. Une fois mariées, les femmes devraient avoir le droit d’obtenir un recours contre la violence conjugale, de demander le divorce et de se voir confier la garde des enfants en cas de séparation, de divorce ou de décès du conjoint. Les femmes devraient aussi jouir d’un plein droit de recours en justice et d’un traitement égal devant les tribunaux aux affaires familiales gérés par l’État ; elles ne devraient pas rester tributaires des jugements rendus par des tribunaux religieux et traditionnels, qui n’ont généralement pas su les protéger, pas plus que leurs enfants, contre des préjudices physiques, psychologiques et économiques. Là où la résistance politique a fait reculer les efforts législatifs visant à accroître les droits des femmes (comme, par exemple, au Mali, comme déjà indiqué), le soutien qui est leur apporté par des coopératives ou des organisations professionnelles ou éducatives peut ouvrir des voies alternatives aux femmes sahéliennes pour accéder à une plus grande autonomie et à des fonctions dirigeantes.

Apporter des services aux minorités marginalisées. Les ministères de la santé et de l’édu- cation devraient veiller à ce que les minorités marginalisées, quel que soit leur isolement géo- graphique ou culturel, bénéficient de leurs pro- grammes de planning familial ou en faveur d’une meilleure éducation des filles et du renforce- ment des droits des femmes. Les expériences antérieures dans d’autres parties du monde portent à croire que les disparités régionales, socio-économiques, ethniques ou de caste en matière de fécondité tendent à se solidifier en des inégalités difficiles à effacer et génératrices d’animosités et de tensions politiques.

Promouvoir des efforts au bénéfice des femmes dans tous les projets de développement ou d’équipement. Qu’ils soient gouvernementaux, privés ou financés par des bail- leurs de fonds étrangers, tous les projets de développement ou d’équipement au Sahel, dans le domaine agricole ou d’autres secteurs économiques, devraient contenir des clauses pour promouvoir une meilleure instruction des filles et des femmes, pour leur aménager un accès plus facile aux services de santé reproductive et pour renforcer leurs droits et leur indépendance financière. Aucun projet soutenu par des donateurs internationaux ne devrait permettre aux pouvoirs publics, partis politiques ou chefs religieux ou traditionnels d’entraver l’émancipation des femmes.

Gérer les tensions autour du partage des res- sources entre agriculteurs et pasteurs. Dans une région aride de plus en plus peuplée, l’avenir des moyens de subsistance agricoles et pastoraux dépendra du développement de l’irrigation, de l’intensification de l’agropastoralisme (soit une intégration plus poussée des utilisations agricoles et pastorales des terres) et de l’accès aux marchés urbains. En vue de ce futur plus peuplé, les gouvernements sahéliens devraient limiter le nombre des grands propriétaires de troupeaux de bétail ne résidant pas sur leurs terres de pâturage, protéger les pâturages de l’empiètement par des agriculteurs et aider les éleveurs à lutter contre le vol de bétail. En parallèle, les pouvoirs publics devraient favoriser l’industrie agro-alimentaire de transformation génératrice de valeur ajoutée, promouvoir la coopération entre agriculteurs et éleveurs et améliorer les moyens de transport et voies d’accès aux marchés urbains.

Protéger les acquis du développement par des investissements dans la sécurité locale. Des groupes djihadistes tendent à se multiplier dans le Sahel et à étendre leur emprise. De ce fait, les poches géographiques où des responsables locaux et une majorité de la population soutiennent l’éducation des filles et le renforcement des droits des femmes deviennent les cibles de choix des militants armés. Aussi, ces communautés locales et leurs dirigeants devraient-ils bénéficier d’une protection spéciale par la police ou les unités antiterroristes.

Read the report in English

Report

Nov 4, 2021

What future for the Western Sahel?

By Richard Cincotta and Stephen Smith

The Western Sahel is in a demographic impasse. To work their way out of this dilemma, Sahelian governments must shift a significant part of their development focus and funding to policies and programs aimed at preventing adolescent marriages and childbearing, promoting girls’ education, securing women’s participation in public- and private-sector workplaces, and achieving small, healthy, well-educated families.

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The post Quel avenir pour le Sahel? appeared first on Atlantic Council.

The Sahel is at a significant turning-point. The region’s evolving security situation has been marked by the military coups across the region and the French announcement to reshape Barkhane. The recent expulsion of the French Ambassador from Mali shows how much the relations between Mali and France have been deteriorating since the military seized power in August 2020 while the Russian parastatal Wagner Group is suspected to augment local forces in the region.

It has been almost ten years since the beginning of the security crisis in the Sahel. In the throes of multiple insurgencies, Sahelian countries and their foreign allies seem to be aware of the limits of military containment. While the international community is working on a new military roadmap, the publication of the report, “Sahel: Moving Beyond Military Containment” offers the opportunity to focus on development issues, too often undermined in the international agenda.

The Sahel is an African region stretching from Mauritania on the Atlantic coast to the Red Sea. Due to its arid climate, the region often suffers from droughts and is one of the most vulnerable regions in the world to climate change.

In December 2021, the launch of the report offered the opportunity to raise the development challenges in this area. Atlantic Council hosted the ministers of economy and/or development of the G5 Sahel (Chad, Mali, Mauritania and Niger-Burkina-Faso’s government was dissolved the day before) and the United Nations Special Coordinator for Development in the Sahel to share their vision of the future of their region, from an economic sustainability, community development and human point of view. Donors can help by moving away from anti-terror kinetic operations towards civilian protection and social projects that better embed the state in local social relations and strengthen local communities in the face of difficult natural conditions.

Authors

Pierre Englebert is a senior fellow at the Africa Center at the Atlantic Council. 

Rida Lyammouri is a senior fellow at the Policy Center for the New South. 

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The region’s demography and its implications by 2045

The Western Sahel—a region stretching from Senegal and Mauritania to Mali, Burkina Faso, Niger, and Chad, and including the twelve sharia law states of northern Nigeria—is in a demographic impasse. Rather than yielding an economic dividend, the conditions spawned by the region’s persistently youthful, rapidly growing, high-fertility populations overwhelm the capabilities of state-run services, generate extensive urban slum conditions, slow if not stall economic and social progress, and aggravate ethnic tensions. Decades of exposure to these mutually reinforcing conditions have undermined the legitimacy of central governments and rendered the region’s states vulnerable to the spread of Islamic populism and regime instability.

Due to the growth momentum of their youthful age structures, from now through the 2040-to-2045 period (the time horizon of this study), the region’s states will be driven to respond to the urgent needs to build infrastructure, increase agricultural productivity, maintain security, and generate jobs in their attempt to employ and politically pacify young-adult cohorts of unprecedented size who, each year, vie to enter the already underemployed Sahelian workforce. Yet these well-intentioned development efforts can never be sufficient unless the region’s governments prioritize policies and programs that address a key underlying impediment to development: sustained high fertility.

To work their way out of this dilemma, Sahelian governments must shift a significant part of their development focus and funding to policies and programs aimed at preventing adolescent marriages and childbearing, promoting girls’ education, securing women’s participation in public- and private-sector workplaces, and achieving small, healthy, well-educated families. However, the region’s persistent jihadist insurgency raises questions as to how far women-centered programs can be safely and successfully extended beyond the edges of the Western Sahel’s inland cities. Absent serious progress on these coupled crises, policy makers in the EU, the United States, and their non-European allies may eventually disengage (as they already have from Somalia today), concluding that containing the Western Sahel’s jihadist insurgency and out-migration at the region’s frontiers is a more viable option than continued development assistance.

Adjoining discussion paper: Regional policy and program perspectives

To gain further insights and cover policy and program issues that extend beyond the authors’ expertise, the Atlantic Council’s Foresight, Strategy, and Risk Initiative commissioned Organizing to Advance Solutions in the Sahel (OASIS), a reproductive health policy organization based in Berkeley, California, to convene a series of consultative discussions among West African public health and education professionals. These professionals discussed the merits of current policy and programmatic approaches in the Sahelian states, identified the major obstacles encountered, and recommended areas for additional effort and investment. A synopsis of these consultations appear in the OASIS discussion paper titled “Accelerating a Demographic Transition”. An additional analysis of international assistance to the Sahel for reproductive health and girls’ education is available in an accompanying OASIS brief. Several of their key points are discussed and cited in this report.

Key findings

Age structure and the demographic window. As a group, the Western Sahelian countries remain among the world’s most youthful populations. Moreover, within the 20-to-25-year period of this report, none of the Western Sahelian countries are projected by the United Nations (UN) Population Division’s medium-fertility projection to reach the demographic window, namely a period of socioeconomically and fiscally favorable age structures (the so-called demographic dividend). Over the past seventy years, it has been within this window—beginning at a median age of around 25 or 26 years—that countries generally have reached upper-middle levels of development (e.g., the World Bank’s upper-middle income category and associated levels of educational attainment and child survival). Notably, Mauritania and Senegal will approach this demographic window by 2045 in the current UN’s low-fertility projection—the most optimistic scenario in the Population Division’s standard series.

Population growth. UN demographers estimate that the overall population of the six states of the Western Sahel has grown from nearly 21 million inhabitants in 1960 to about 103 million in 2020—an almost five-fold increase over sixty years. For the twelve states of northern Nigeria, the authors’ modeled estimates suggest that the population trajectory has been comparably steep, reaching nearly 78 million in 2020. Those sources expect the combined populations of the six Western Sahelian countries and northern Nigeria to grow from today’s estimate of about 181 million to somewhere between a projected high, in 2045, of about 415 million, and a projected low of about 370 million people. Much of this growth is produced by age-structural momentum, a largely unavoidable consequence of the region’s extremely youthful age distribution.

Fertility decline. The region’s total fertility rates currently range between about 4.6 children per woman in Senegal and Mauritania, to pretransition rates—above 6.5 children per woman—in Niger and the twelve sharia law states of northern Nigeria. Throughout the Western Sahel, rates of adolescent childbearing remain extremely high, and ideal family size generally equals or exceeds realized fertility. Even in the recent past—up to and including the UN’s 2010 data series—the Population Division’s medium-fertility projections for the countries of the Western Sahel have proved overly optimistic. Yet, recent local surveys in the region indicate that the current version of its medium-fertility projection is not out of reach. That scenario assumes that, between 2040 and 2045, fertility will decline to between 3.4 and 4.0 children per woman in most of the Western Sahel’s states, and near 4.7 in Niger. Significant differences in modern contraceptive use and patterns of childbearing are already evident between rural women and more educated urban women, but the differences are not yet as pronounced as in East or southern Africa, where fertility decline is proceeding at a faster pace.

Maternal and child health, as well as girls’ education. Whereas childhood mortality has steadily declined in the Western Sahel, still one in ten children die before the age of five in Mali and Chad. Recent World Health Organization (WHO) estimates indicate that in Niger and Chad, more than 40 percent of children below age five exhibit stunting. According to the WHO, Chad’s maternal mortality rate is the world’s second highest, while Mauritania, Mali, and Niger are also among the twenty countries in which pregnancy and childbirth are the most dangerous. In Chad and Niger, just one in five eligible girls are enrolled in secondary school, and net secondary enrollment has yet to rise above 40 percent elsewhere in the region. Adolescent marriages remain the region’s most serious deterrent to increasing girls’ educational attainment.

Women’s autonomy and rights. Despite the advice of regional health professionals and the criticisms of UN agencies, successive governments have, so far, done little to enforce already existing laws that would reduce adolescent marriages, eliminate female genital cutting, protect women from forced marriages, restrict polygamy, and give women inheritance rights and custody of their own children in case of marital separation or widowhood. While women’s advocates see these as key to a shift in preferences to smaller, healthier, and better-educated families, current Sahelian political leadership fears political blowback. High levels of organized resistance—such as the large demonstrations by Islamic organizations in Mali, in 2009, that turned back women’s rights—have convinced some development professionals that for several states in the Western Sahel, the only route to change currently available may be through intensive investments in girls’ education and financial support for women’s health care networks, as well as progressive legal, professional, educational, and cooperative societies.

Farming. Despite rising temperatures and the recent slowdown of cropland expansion, the growth of grain production has, since 1990, exceeded the pace of the region’s roughly three percent per year rate of population growth. However, due to erratic harvests on mar- ginally productive croplands, armed conflict, and the presence of displaced populations, the region’s states are regular recipients of substantial food aid. Whereas ground-water irrigation is likely to become a more important input in the future, the combined effects of future population growth, continued climatic warming, persistent insurgency, and periodic drought in the Western Sahel make food self-sufficiency highly unlikely in the foreseeable future.

Pastoralism. After three decades of relatively steady increases in rainfall in parts of the region, livestock numbers (adjusted for species body-size differences) have grown significantly since the 1990s. Yet the most productive pastoral rangelands, put under the plow by growing populations of dryland farmers, have dwindled in surface area. Meanwhile, the numbers of grazing-rights holders have proliferated and vegetation on the remaining rangelands have dramatically deteriorated in form and forage quality, precipitating shifts from cattle to sheep and goats. Across the Sahel, agro-ecologists have noted the emergence of what they call neopastoral production systems that feature wealthy absentee owners of large herds, the proliferation of light but sophisticated weaponry, and a growing impoverished and politically marginalized pastoral underclass that is increasingly vulnerable to radicalization.

Security. The region is in the throes of rapidly growing Islamic insurgencies. Whereas demographic models of persistent non-territorial (revolutionary) conflict predict substantial declines in the risk of such conflict during the demographic window, none of the region’s states are currently projected by the UN Population Division to reach that window during the period of this report. Thus, the authors’ models suggest that ongoing conflicts in Niger, Burkina Faso, Mali, Chad, and northern Nigeria are statistically likely to continue, at some level, through the 2040-2045 period. Unlike the Marxist-inspired insurgencies that ignited across Southeast Asia and Latin America during the second half of the twentieth century, the jihadist presence in the rural portions of the Western Sahel restricts the educational progress of women, their autonomy, and delivery of the family planning services that could facilitate fertility decline and improve reproductive health and nutrition.

Urbanization. The rapidly growing urban population of the six countries of the Western Sahel currently comprises about one-third of the region’s population and is projected to approach half by 2045. Despite laudable investments in housing that have dramatically reduced the proportion of slum dwellers in the urban population in several states, these efforts have been outpaced by rapid urban growth. Consequently, the region’s slum-resident population has nearly doubled since 1990. As income-generating opportunities evaporate in the agricultural and livestock sectors, the hopes of young men will rest on the urban job market and the educational opportunities that make them fit for employment. Yet employment in the formal sector of the economy will remain elusive throughout the region, and rapid urbanization is bound to present new housing, fresh water, energy, health, sanitation, and security challenges. Still, if governments and donors heavily invest, urban transformation could stimulate transitions to greater female autonomy and smaller, better educated, more well-nourished families with skills and prospects for urban employment in the region.

Migration. Between 1990 and 2015, more than 80 percent of migrant flows that originated in the six Western Sahelian countries ended beyond the region’s borders. During this period, slightly more than 60 percent of the net outward flows were added to populations in other African countries, whereas nearly 40 percent were added to populations in Europe, North America, and destinations elsewhere. Senegal and Nigeria in particular, represent significant migrant gateways to Europe and North America. This analysis does not even account for substantial refugee flows during the 2015-2020 period, which are associated with escalating conflict in the Lake Chad Basin, Niger, Burkina Faso, and Mali. For young Sahelians surviving on marginal rural livelihoods and in urban slums, episodic drought, looming conflict, and sustained economic hardship represent weighty “push factors” that readily tip personal decision-making toward migration. In this arid and poorly developed part of the world, the region’s population size is clearly important. It adds to the ranks of those in marginal livelihoods who might be pressured to leave during episodic disasters and seek greater opportunities elsewhere, while creating few “pull factors” encouraging potential migrants to stay.

Models of demographic progress

The report also highlights the pathways taken by three countries that politically, programmatically, and without coercion, facilitated relatively rapid fertility transitions and age-structural transformations: Tunisia, Botswana, and Bangladesh. While these states differ geographically, culturally, and economically from the Western Sahelian states, their demographic starting points were similar. Initially, each experienced a broadly pyramidal profile with a median age under twenty years and, in each, the total fertility rate was estimated at between six and seven children per woman. To these, the paper adds a discussion of ongoing programmatic efforts that are influencing the patterns of reproduction in Ethiopia, Malawi, and Rwanda.

Tunisia. This North African country’s rapid journey out of the age-structural transition’s youthful phase was the product of the vision and leadership of Habib Bourguiba, the country’s first president. His Neo-Destour political party legislated a package of pro-women reforms, including laws that compelled parents to send their daughters to school, raised the legal age of marriage, prohibited polygamy, gave women full inheritance rights, made divorce a judicial process, provided decentralized centers of voluntary family planning, mandated that women could work outside the home, opposed the veil, and curtailed the power of local imams.

Botswana. From its inception, professional care and affordability have been key elements of this country’s reproductive health effort. Family planning services, provided free of charge since 1970, were directly integrated into maternal and child health care at all local primary health facilities. Moreover, the country is one of the few in the sub-Saharan region where girls’ secondary-school enrollment rates—now above 90 percent—exceed boys’ rates. While Botswana shared the initial challenge of high rates of adolescent pregnancy and early marriage with Sahelian countries, its history of effective governance and wise use of mineral rents sets Botswana apart from most countries in sub-Saharan Africa.

Bangladesh. This country’s remarkable demographic turnaround was brought about by a dedicated health administration that mobilized tens of thousands of community-based health workers and volunteers, teamed up with a local non-governmental organization called Bangladesh Rural Advancement Committee (BRAC), and used an infusion of health commodities and funds from foreign donors. Begun in 1975, Bangladesh’s successful donor-funded approach and its country-wide public-health communications program helped trigger demand for other long-term contraception methods (e.g., injectables and implants), countrywide expansion of the village worker program, and formalization of Bangladesh’s public health supply chain.

Programs in East Africa. Applying lessons learned from Asia and Latin America, reproductive health programs in Ethiopia, Kenya, Malawi, and Rwanda have attained strong support from national leaders, achieved high public profiles, and obtained strong financial commitments from foreign donors. Over the past three decades, greater attention to girls’ educational attainment, organized efforts to augment women’s reproductive rights and increase political participation, and effective public health communications have improved the effectiveness of donor-funded programs for maternal and child health as well as family planning. Significant service delivery and contraceptive acceptance challenges remain in each of these eastern African countries, including high contraceptive-discontinuation rates, and wide gaps in contraceptive use between the lowest-income households and wealthier, urban families.

Scenarios

In situations of crisis and uncertainty, scenarios help reduce the scope of options and unveil poorly visible possibilities that could, in the future, catch policy makers unaware. These fictitious futures allow analysts to depart from the most obvious event trajectories and explore other possibilities without having to imagine discontinuities or explain complex chains of events that, throughout history, have led to surprises. For the sake of didactic brevity, we present the following three scenarios under the guise of news dispatches, which shine a light on the situation in the Western Sahel in the early 2040s.

“More of the Same.” In an interregional summit, held in 2043, the European Union (EU) and an organization of Sahelian states agree to a fourth five-year multilateral Migration Convention. The agreement limits and controls the flow of migrants from and through the Sahel in return for a generous increase in the EU’s regional aid package. Girls’ school enrollments continue to rise in the region, and modern contraceptive use increases slowly, spreading from the burgeoning urban areas into smaller cities and towns. However, governments make little serious effort to expand women’s rights or to perturb the patriarchal system that condones adolescent marriages and childbearing. Meanwhile, some Western Sahelian states have instituted cash income supplements for stay-at-home mothers, offering an alternative to women competing in the region’s crowded job market. Meanwhile, Sahelian states continue to pool military resources to contain jihadist groups that remain active across the rural Sahel.

“Breakthrough.” A summit of the expanded group known as G7/Sahel, held in 2043, opens with the rollout of a UN-sponsored report highlighting a reproductive turnaround in several member states in the region and outlines significant progress in others. A local representative of the UN Population Fund (UNFPA) reports on the results of demographic and health surveys indicating that, in both Senegal and Burkina Faso, countrywide total fertility rates have fallen below three children per woman, and that Niger appears to be following on a similar path. Local surveys in several Sahelian cities provide evidence that fertility is near the two-child-per-woman replacement level and that maternal and childhood clinical caseloads as well as school class sizes have dramatically declined. Despite a slowdown in the region’s rate of population increase, ongoing growth due to momentum, increasing temperatures, periodic crop failures, and sporadic jihadist violence, grain imports and food aid remain critical elements of the food-security equation in the Sahel.

“Downward Spiral.” In a UN Security Council session convened in 2043, the Sahel’s special representative calls for international action to address a multifaceted crisis unfolding across the Western Sahel. He describes Somalia-like state failures and territorial infighting among warlords in Mali and Chad, and further outlines deteriorating security conditions across the Hausa-speaking regions of northern Nigeria and Niger, where loosely affiliated jihadist groups have proliferated and, in some cases, gained political control. He also notes that airfields in the Sahel have become the interregional hub for moving contraband, including human trafficking. In his report, the Sahel’s special representative calls the Security Council’s attention to Niger, currently in the throes of a famine on a scale that occurred in the latter half of the twentieth century. This time, Niamey, the capital, is faced with feeding a population nearing sixty million, rather than the 5.2 million of the mid-1970s. Senegal, the region’s only gateway for food aid and other humanitarian assistance, is also the jumping-off place for illegal migration to Europe.

Recommendations

For international aid donors, the report offers a general recommendation: Successful demographic turnarounds over the coming twenty to twenty-five years would feature at least one, and hopefully two, countrywide programmatic success stories, providing exemplars of best practices, a pool of local expertise, and models of community participation that might spread elsewhere. Senegal may be the best candidate to host such a model program. Another focused effort should be launched in an inland state—perhaps Burkina Faso, if its rural areas are pacified. In Niger, Mali, and Chad, the most effective interventions will likely be those that vastly improve urban services and expand a trained cadre of dedicated health workers to deploy in urban peripheries and refugee camps, where demands for education, family planning, and other reproductive services are typically high. In addition to the more general take-aways, the report’s specific recommendations are as follows:

Gain from urbanization. By 2045, nearly half of the region’s growing population is projected to live in urban areas. If services can be mobilized and funded, it will be in these urban centers that young Sahelians receive the vocational and professional education and attain the income-generating employment that could keep many of them from slipping into the illegal or extremist margins of their societies. It is imperative that girls’ education and voluntary family planning—along with other reproductive, maternal, and child health services—are also in place in these expanding cities and towns, and that women gain access to both the private- and public-sector workforce.

Ramp up girls’ education and family planning. Governments in the region should reinvigorate their commitments to increasing levels of girls’ educational attainment and, with the assistance of international donors, vastly increase levels of spending on family planning and other reproductive health services. States should elevate the administrative profile of family planning to a ministerial responsibility and augment its public profile through information campaigns. Education and health administrations should eliminate bureaucratic, traditional, and religious barriers to girls’ school attendance and facilitate easy and affordable access to family planning services for both married as well as single individuals. Methods of delivery that directly bring basic reproductive health services to people in their urban neighborhoods and rural homes—including village health workers and mobile clinics—may prove most effective in Sahelian conditions. At this stage of development, it would be helpful if Sahelian professional societies develop an online library of local success stories that cover girls’ education, family planning, as well as sexual and reproductive health.

Work with respected religious and political leaders, and other public figures; involve and inform men. Exposure to supportive messages from religious leaders who address questions of religious acceptability is generally associated with higher levels of modern contraceptive use. Moreover, recent studies indicate that local programs that inform and involve men and seek the support of local leaders may be the most likely to succeed in the Western Sahel. For decades, health communicators have worked with television and radio producers as well as entertainers, particularly those involved in popular daytime dramas (i.e., soap operas) and talk shows to impart public service messaging concerning maternal and child health, nutrition, HIV/AIDS, family planning, women’s rights, and sexual relationships.

Augment women’s rights. In the Western Sahel, much can be accomplished by protecting girls and women from multiple forms of discrimination and violence, and by expanding their rights in marriage. This effort begins by enforcing current national laws that already prohibit all forms of female genital cutting, that outlaw forced marriages, and prohibit marriage before the age of eighteen years. Once married, the region’s women should deserve the rights to initiate divorce, obtain recourse against violence, and secure custodianship over their children in case of marital separation, divorce, or the death of their spouse. Women should have the right to legal recourse and equal treatment in state-run family courts of law, rather than being limited to the judgments of religious and traditional courts, which have generally failed to protect women and children from physical, psychological, and economic harm. Where political resistance has rolled back legislative efforts to augment women’s rights (as it has been the case in Mali), government support and endorsement of women’s legal, professional, cooperative, and educational societies may offer alternative routes for many Sahelian women to achieve greater autonomy and attain leadership positions.

Bring services to marginalized minorities. Health and education ministries should ensure that significant programmatic efforts in girls’ education, voluntary family planning, and women’s rights be distributed, in some form, among marginalized minorities—no matter how geographically or culturally isolated these minorities might be. Prior experiences in other regions suggest that regional, socioeconomic, ethnic, or caste fertility disparities later develop into hard-to-overcome social and economic inequalities that generate political tensions and exacerbate animosities.

Promote women-centered efforts in all agricultural, economic, and infrastructural development projects. All government, private, and donor-supported projects should contain components that facilitate extending girls’ educational attainment and/or quality of education, improve access to reproductive health services, and promote women’s rights and their economic autonomy. No donor-supported project should facilitate the efforts of governments, political parties, or traditional and religious leaders to impede women’s progress in any sector of development.

Manage resource-related tensions between farming and pastoralism. In a more-populous Western Sahel, the future of agricultural and pastoral livelihoods will depend on the development of groundwater irrigation and intensified agropastoralism (a more deliberate integration of agricultural and grazing uses of land), as well as their relation to urban markets. In this more-populous future, the region’s governments should consider enforcing schemes that restrict absentee rangeland users, protect rangelands from further agricultural encroachment, and help pastoralists deter cattle rustling. Meanwhile, governments in the Western Sahel should continue to develop industries that add value to agricultural and livestock products, promote cooperation between farmers and pastoralists, and develop more efficient transport to urban markets.

Protect development gains with investments in local security. In an environment of rapidly spreading jihadist conflict, geographic pockets of progressive local leadership and popular support for girls’ education and other women-centered programs could become primary targets of militants. Affected communities and their leaders deserve special protection provided by police or anti-terrorist units.

Watch the official launch event

Public Event Tue, March 22, 2022 • 11:30 am ET

Report launch | Demographic trends in the Western Sahel

Official launch event of the Scowcroft Center report, “What Future for the Western Sahel? The Region’s Demography and Its Implications by 2045,” in which the authors argue that unless the Sahelian states focus on reversing the underlying conditions that sustain high fertility, they are unlikely to dislodge the mutually reinforcing crises of instability, forced migration, and food insecurity in the foreseeable future.

Africa Energy & Environment Human Rights Politics & Diplomacy

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Report

Mar 7, 2022

Quel avenir pour le Sahel?

By Richard Cincotta and Stephen Smith

Le Sahel est dans une impasse démographique. S’ils veulent sortir de l’impasse actuelle, les gouvernements sahéliens devront réorienter une partie importante de leurs efforts de développement et moyens financiers vers des politiques et programmes visant à améliorer la condition féminine : en prévenant les mariages et grossesses précoces chez les adolescentes, en promouvant l’éducation des filles et en garantissant la pleine participation des femmes dans tous les secteurs publics et privés, à commencer par les lieux de travail.

Africa Energy & Environment

The Foresight, Strategy, and Risks Initiative (FSR) provides actionable foresight and innovative strategies to a global community of policymakers, business leaders, and citizens. 

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Despite the presence of a UN peacekeeping mission since 1999 and billions of dollars in aid—with the United States contributing more than nine hundred million dollars in humanitarian assistance in the past two years alone—today the eastern Congo is reportedly home to more than 120 rebel groups. Those include numerous foreign-backed militias and a local offshoot of the Islamic State. 

They control roadways and access to resources, and they often engage in kidnapping schemes to generate ransom revenue. Securing their buy-in to any peace processes is key to ensuring lasting stability. 

In fact, the majority of the world’s conflicts feature armed non-state actors (ANSAs), with some sixty-six million people living on territory under their control. The Taliban’s recent takeover in Afghanistan is a fresh reminder of the power of these groups. But traditional attempts at post-conflict stabilization have sometimes failed to produce lasting peace—in large part because of their inability to engage ANSAs in a constructive manner within the peace-building process.

That’s why Congress in 2019 created the Global Fragility Act (GFA), which lays out an array of tools with which to stabilize post-conflict situations. These range from sanctions and intelligence collection to the Women, Peace, and Security initiative and the National Strategy for Counterterrorism. 

But the GFA features a major shortcoming: It assumes the state is the primary actor, meaning that the United States will continue to work with sometimes ineffective national governments while ignoring the influence and power ANSAs have in determining stability. 

To maximize the impact of the GFA, the US government will select five countries on which to focus its attention. As it considers those countries, it needs to properly accommodate ANSAs in its strategic calculations. Failing to do so means potentially repeating the mistakes of Afghanistan, where Washington continued supporting an ineffective national government.  

Mapping the next threat

There is no universal definition of an ANSA; it can be characterized as an organization that is not integrated into formalized institutions, operates with some sort of political autonomy, or is willing to use violence to pursue its political objectives. Either way, ANSAs are involved in the majority of the one hundred active armed conflicts around the world—including Afghanistan, where the Taliban is now in charge, and Syria, where a multitude of armed groups control various pieces of territory. 

Similar dynamics have existed in parts of northeastern Nigeria, where Boko Haram has effectively functioned as the government by levying taxes on the populations under its control or providing some semblance of a justice system to settle disputes. While it no longer controls the amount of territory it did in the early 2010s, the group remains a disruptive and destabilizing force. Now, as the much-criticized US strategy in the Sahel has seen limited success and the Nigerian state appears increasingly weak, the potential for increased conflict there is high. 

More than simply controlling territory, ANSAs also serve a critical regional governance function, providing services and either formal or informal governing structures. 

At the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic, for example, ANSAs around the world imposed travel restrictions and implemented health checks in the regions they control. This serves to portray them as legitimate in the eyes of local citizens, which in turn provides them greater political weight and influence over the structure of power-sharing agreements. ANSAs can also be potential spoilers by intentionally undermining the peace process if they believe it threatens their power. 

The foreign aid trap

The GFS calls for humanitarian, development, and security assistance to be provided as a tool to address state fragility, with a focus on working with the local government and civil society. But in regions where ANSAs perform governance functions, providing foreign aid sometimes directly clashes with American counterterrorism priorities. 

In Nigeria, for instance, USAID efforts were hampered by rules limiting engagement with people who had a previous affiliation with Boko Haram. But the definition of “affiliation” is broad and does not specify whether family members of militants are also excluded from aid—putting the onus on aid workers to investigate any potential linkages. That, in turn, stalls the rollout of humanitarian assistance. 

The Boko Haram rule is well-intentioned, as terrorist organizations should indeed be cut off from American aid, but the provision of foreign assistance is a key component in any effective stabilization operation. The United States is currently facing that very dilemma in a newly Taliban-controlled Afghanistan. Washington has not announced whether it plans to officially recognize the Taliban, which is still under numerous sanctions, further complicating assistance plans.

But as in Nigeria, delivering aid is central to creating stability. That’s why the State Department and all other implementing agencies will need to find ways to ensure aid is sent to these conflict areas, and that it actually reaches vulnerable populations, without undermining its counterterrorism goals. This could include clarifying what an acceptable affiliation is, or by providing assistance in contested zones through NGOs or other third parties, such as the UN—therefore not undermining US counterterrorism goals.

Trading for stability

Like foreign assistance, commercial trade is another crucial factor in securing sustainable peace—at least when the state maintains control of its territory. The GFA recognizes this, which is why trade, investment, and commercial diplomacy is seen as another tool to ensure stability by investing in low-income states and building a robust free market. 

But when ANSAs are involved, they can limit this free market and thwart the stabilizing potential of these economic relationships.

For example, these groups often exploit natural resources for economic gain, own valuable land, or nurture ties to corrupt officials. They are rent-seekers aiming to maximize their economic profit. This is why stabilization efforts should provide incentives for them to engage in the peace-building process—ideally transforming their informal and illegal economic structures into legitimate economic activities. 

Consider the Philippines: A peace agreement between the government and the Moro Islamic Liberation Front in 2014 created the Bangasmoro, an autonomous political body for the majority Muslim areas in Mindanao. Despite the otherwise successful terms of the peace agreement, which created a power-sharing mechanism, fragile state institutions and corrupt officials meant a deep-seated informal economy took root, compromising the state’s capacity to ensure stability. 

Any tools relating to trade, investment, and commercial diplomacy must fully integrate ANSAs into the free market, preventing their rent-seeking activities while simultaneously squeezing out informal economies. To this end, the United States should develop poverty-reduction and anti-corruption programs that reduce incentives for joining the informal economy. Other actions could include legitimizing illicit sources of income, such as offering incentives for growing legal crops instead of narcotics.

The GFA provides a chance to redefine and reimagine post-conflict stabilization operations. But its tools must better consider the presence of ANSAs to ensure the best chance at success. In its current form, the GFA ignores vital actors in the stabilization process and has not learned from prior operations that failed to integrate and plan for ANSAs, such as in Afghanistan or the Sahel. 

Given the evolving nature of today’s conflicts, a strong ANSA strategy could mean the difference between lasting peace and metastasizing violence. 

Imran Bayoumi is a student at the University of Toronto’s Munk School of Global Affairs & Public Policy and a former young global professional at the Atlantic Council.

Further reading

New Atlanticist Jun 10, 2021

The best defense: Why NATO should invest in resilience

By Jaclyn Levy

Policies emphasizing resilience should minimize damage, restore stability quickly, and generate improved strategies. To this end, there are several steps NATO can take to build a preventive, resilience-based approach to emerging global challenges.

Europe & Eurasia NATO

New Atlanticist Jul 22, 2021

Why ‘human security’ matters for tomorrow’s conflicts

By Sarah Dawn Petrin

NATO leaders are finally focusing on human security, a major step toward a broader vision of crisis management.

Conflict Europe & Eurasia

New Atlanticist Aug 26, 2021

Before the Taliban took Afghanistan, it took the internet

By Emerson T. Brooking

This is how the Afghan Taliban waged—and won—a generation-long information war.

Afghanistan Conflict

The post To build lasting peace, you can’t ignore militant groups appeared first on Atlantic Council.

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Date:
From:
To:
Cable from Mali:
Classification:

8/27/2021
Olivier-Rémy Bel and Petr Tůma
European and American policymakers
Last chance to bring the Sahel back from the brink
Unclassified

This summer, fellows with the Atlantic Council’s Europe Center conducted a study trip to Mali as part of an ongoing project exploring European involvement in the Sahel region. They cabled their thoughts back to the home office for the first edition of the Atlantic Council’s “Cable from.”

Summary: While our interlocutors in Mali were split, focusing either on areas showing progress or those that are deteriorating, they did agree on one thing: The country is at an inflection point. Against the backdrop of two coups, interethnic and terrorist violence moving south toward Bamako, and France shifting its posture in the Sahel, this could be the last chance to stabilize Mali. Doing so will require fostering greater Malian ownership of the political, security, and development processes, both by understanding local dynamics and by asking for greater accountability from national authorities. It will also require improving coordination among Europeans—now contributing to stabilization efforts in ever greater numbers—and thereby creating a “European art of the coalition.”

Sitting along the banks of the Niger River, which was starting to swell as the rainy season picked up, we listened to our host, a seasoned European diplomat, describe the complexities of his job. As the patches of water hyacinths drifted away, carried by the swirls and eddies of the current, the situation seemed as murky as the waters. 

With its billion-dollar stabilization effort, counterterrorism operations, and attempts at state-building, Mali invites a comparison with Afghanistan. Substitute the Americans for the French and the towering heights of the Pamirs with the endless expanses of the Sahara, and this is Europe’s Afghanistan.

While lessons can be drawn from Afghanistan—particularly in terms of empowering local partners, shifting towards a lighter footprint without generating a collapse, sustaining public support for intervention, and managing a coalition—Mali is a country that must be understood in its own right. For instance, terrorists in the Sahel do not have the equipment and experience of the Taliban, there are no neighboring countries providing shelter and support, and the ethnic and political dynamics are unique.

A former French colony, the butterfly-shaped country stretches along the Niger River, which flows from the greener south to the more arid north. Its banks are home to many ethnic groups, from the Bambara majority in the south to the Bozo fishermen, Fulani herders, and Dogon farmers in the center, and the Tuaregs in the north.

In 2012, as the crumbling state faced Tuareg separatists and jihadists moving south, it turned to France for help. The French-run Operation Serval stopped the advance before being transformed into a regional counterterrorism operation called Barkhane. The international community, especially Europeans, has been present in greater numbers, notably through the United Nations Multidimensional Integrated Stabilization Mission in Mali (MINUSMA) and the European Union Training Mission Mali (EUTM). Regional actors have attempted to organize themselves by creating the G5 Sahel and its joint force, while the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS) is also stepping up, playing an important political role in the aftermath of the 2020 and 2021 coups. 

Today, the jihadist threat mostly emanates from the Islamic State in the Greater Sahara (ISGS) and the Jama’at Nasr al-Islam wal Muslimin (JNIM), an Al-Qaeda franchise. While the situation in northern Mali, the Tuareg heartland, is now more stable, violence is moving south. 

Clashes with the ISGS mostly take place in the tri-border region where Mali, Niger, and Burkina Faso meet. But international efforts in the area—particularly the G5 Sahel joint force and Task Force Takuba, a newly stood-up European special forces operation—have so far been able to contain and degrade the jihadists. Central Mali, however, is seeing a larger JNIM presence, which feeds off a cycle of interethnic violence mostly between the Dogon and Fulani communities. 

This movement south of both interethnic and terrorist violence is spilling over into neighboring countries, notably Burkina Faso, and could threaten the coastal states, such as Côte d’Ivoire.

1. Is this Mali’s last chance?

As we moved from interview to interview, critical questions were on everyone’s mind: Are the international community and Malian authorities actually making progress? Or have we already lost the war? Could Mali go the way of Afghanistan?

It’s difficult to find consensus on even that basic assessment. 

The Malian Armed Forces (FAMa) are better trained and equipped than they were a few years ago. The sort of deadly attacks seen in 2018-2019, when entire military camps were overrun by terrorists, are repelled. Present in a greater part of the country’s territory, Malian forces conduct more complex operations, including alongside French troops, and are beginning to develop air power by relying on Brazilian-made Super Tucano planes. Multiple senior terrorist leaders have been killed, and the north enjoys an uneasy peace—or at least a form of tacit stability.

At the same time, terrorist attacks are occurring closer to the capital than ever before. The central part of the country is continuing its downward spiral of interethnic violence, catching in its wake neighboring Burkina Faso and possibly Guinea and Cote d’Ivoire, along Mali’s southern border. At the political level, the 2015 Algiers Agreement, aimed at restoring peace in Mali through a process of political reconciliation and decentralization, is still not fully implemented. Moreover, the country has experienced two coups within one year, signaling severe institutional fragility.

In Bamako, as well as in European capitals where we also conducted interviews, frustration is palpable among Europeans. Everybody agrees that the only solution for stabilizing Mali is a political one—though with an important military component due to terrorists’ advances—and it can only be Malian. But are the country’s elites ready and eager enough to move boldly and implement the necessary political and administrative reforms? 

This may be the last chance to do so for three reasons:

a. After the coup last summer, which ousted President Ibrahim Boubacar Keïta following contested elections, army colonels led by Assimi Goïta seized power. The resulting civilian transitional government grew increasingly autonomous. After the government kicked out two key figures in the August 2020 coup without properly coordinating with Goïta, the colonels could feel power slipping from their hands. They conducted a second coup in May 2021, ousting transitional President Bah N’daw. If the ongoing process of political transition isn’t successful, there is serious potential for further destabilization. The two coups have, to some extent, served as a wake-up call for Europeans.

b. Interethnic violence and terrorism are moving south toward the demographic and economic heart of the country. While the Bambara majority and elites may have been reluctant to invest politically and militarily in the north—where Bamako traditionally had only limited control and applied a divide-and-rule approach—this more immediate threat is becoming increasingly existential and might spur the government toward more responsible behavior. The government should convince people of its reliability and gain their trust. Otherwise, Malians won’t be ready to defend it, and the country risks falling into a tailspin as happened in Afghanistan immediately after the withdrawal of foreign support. Europe is able to train enough Malian soldiers, as the coalition managed to do in Afghanistan. The problem lies in the meaningful deployment of these troops when the government is not working properly or is perceived as such. 

c. France is adopting a new approach in the Sahel. President Emmanuel Macron recently announced the end of Operation Barkhane in its current form, with a drawdown from 5,100 troops to as low as around 2,500 in 2022. While this could be compared to the US withdrawal from Afghanistan, the transformation of the French presence is less about numbers and more about doing things differently—a shift toward a support-and-accompany model. This is a move in the right direction, but will it be enough to empower Malian forces?

We also spoke with Malian civil-society and religious leaders, who stressed the need for Europeans to engage more on the local level rather than just with Bamako and to be more responsive to local contexts. That’s something that is occasionally difficult even for Malian officials themselves, who often come from the south, which can lead to mutual mistrust. Development projects that have been implemented outside Bamako and other urban areas have had only limited impact and sustainability, as they were missing a sense of ownership and trust from the local population. Local civic representatives often pointed to the communication deficit of Malian officials and the Malian army in rural areas where people may be afraid of their operations and plans, which creates yet another obstacle for state-building efforts.   

As the international community talks about “the return of the Malian state”—and we heard a lot about “PSDG,” the acronym standing for security, development, and governance hubs—the big question is: Which state is returning? In some areas, the Malian state was never fully present to begin with. In others, sending civil servants from the south might not always be the best solution. What matters is the ability to provide concrete public services.

2. Creating a “European art of the coalition”

Bamako is an interesting place to meet Europeans. Today, the Sahel hosts the largest deployment of European military forces worldwide, with around eight thousand personnel. It has also been a key focus of diplomatic efforts and international development assistance; Europe alone has spent nearly ten billion dollars on the region since 2014.

Paris led the response to the Malian government’s 2012 call for assistance and is still an indispensable player, owing to its deep historical ties with Mali and relatively large military and diplomatic presence in the country. Yet European troops have been accompanying their French counterparts from the outset. Operation Serval was enabled by British and Spanish airlift capabilities. Sweden took a leading role early on through the United Nations peacekeeping mission (MINUSMA) in Mali.

The European military presence in Mali has grown in recent years. Countries are sending ever larger contingents (German troops number almost one thousand, for example) or contributing in new formats—such as Czech special forces accompanying Malians in combat as part of counterterrorism-focused Task Force Takuba. Some, mostly in southern Europe, fear potential migration and other spillover effects if the “neighbors of their neighbors” were to be destabilized. For others, it’s about deepening the relationship with France or demonstrating their commitment to European solidarity.

In fact, Europeans and other players have been entering the Malian theater to such an extent that it has created a traffic jam. Coordination among the various military forces—the FAMa, the EUTM, Barkhane, MINUSMA, the G5 Sahel Joint Force—is a complex challenge. However, the introduction of Instance de coordination militaire au Mali, a platform for regular meetings among all force commanders, appears to have helped. 

On the development side, coordination among Europeans, Americans, and other major multilateral donors needs improvement. The same challenge already exists among European countries, since each has its own national agenda, timeline, and procedures. Representatives of several local NGOs complained to us that European development projects often overlap, periodically focusing on the same sectors, when their help may really be needed elsewhere. In this crowded landscape, the EU delegation seems to have emerged as an important place for Europeans to synchronize their actions. Still, it is far from what is needed, as it lacks a mandate strong enough to overcome EU nations’ bilateral interests.

More broadly, this is all an exercise in creating a “European art of the coalition.” So far, European forces have mostly deployed and worked together in coalitions that required a US backbone, as in Afghanistan. When they have deployed alone, such as in the Democratic Republic of Congo or Chad, they have rarely had to operate in such a difficult and complex environment, or handle so much civilian-military coordination, as they have in Mali. 

This applies particularly to the relationship between France and other European nations. While the French have a more extensive historical background in Mali and are clearly the leading European actor there, Paris will have to adapt its leadership to account for the growing influence of other European players. It is not in the position to play the same role the United States played in Afghanistan, and must instead strive to find its own way to compel Europeans to work together.

The Sahel is often described as a laboratory for strategic autonomy, where Europeans learn how to work together and hone their political, diplomatic and military instruments. This kind of European coalition-building may be one of the most potent experiments.

3. Learning to speak the language of power

Sometimes Europeans are shy about translating their preeminent presence and investment into political power. The COVID-19 crisis has shown them to be less proactive—or less unashamedly self-promoting—than, say, the Chinese. For instance, Chinese officials did well in convincing Malians that China was responsible for most of the COVID-related help that Mali received from abroad, even though that was not the case. Russia is also making some advances in Mali, notably agitating pro-Russian demonstrations, exploring yet another opportunity to make life more difficult for the West. 

If Europe wants Malians to truly own the stabilization process, it must avoid creating a dependency or establishing a presence there that only benefits the elite. This was indeed one of the problems in Afghanistan, leading to the abysmal failure of its government and army. As soon as the United States departed, people were unprepared to fight for a government they didn’t trust.

If the EU and its member states are to provide such substantial assistance to Mali, they should be able to attach more conditions to the provision of those resources. One oft-cited example is the Malian army’s lack of a digital human-resources management system, which means it cannot know the precise number or whereabouts of its soldiers. Given that half of the FAMa have been trained by the EUTM, Europe should be in a position to more forcefully ask for this type of reform. The Malian government seems less responsive to European requests than governments in other areas of major European engagement abroad, such as Iraq. 

The European diplomats we met in Mali viewed this hazard as one of the major risks that could undermine the success of European engagement there. It is also understood, at least on paper, by Brussels: April’s EU Integrated Strategy in the Sahel emphasizes the concept of “mutual accountability,” while the European Council in May opened the door to sanctions on Malian politicians and military leaders. 

These lessons learned in Mali are part of a broader ongoing EU adaptation to a more challenging strategic environment. From the ambitions of a “geopolitical Commission” to chief diplomat Josep Borrell’s chaotic Moscow trip to the EU’s tough retaliation against Belarusian President Alyaksandr Lukashenka’s hijacking of a Ryanair flight, Europe is not only searching for its place in a more dangerous world but also learning to respond to such a world. Far from simply learning to speak the language of power, it is experimenting with wielding it.

Lessons for the future

Mali and Afghanistan are indeed very different theaters for intervening forces. 

There isn’t a single organization in Mali as popular as the Taliban, uniting opposition to the government. Rebel groups are often fighting one another; even the Tuaregs in the north can’t aspire to the level of prominence enjoyed by the Taliban in Afghanistan.

Still, that doesn’t preclude the risk that the outcome may one day appear similar if the proper lessons aren’t learned. The fall of Kabul is a major development for Europe, which must be in a position to react to a crisis even when the United States is unwilling to intervene. 

After years of talking about strategic autonomy, Europe must get serious about it. This is what’s at stake in Mali.

Expert

Olivier-Rémy Bel

Nonresident Senior Fellow

Europe Center

Defense Industry Defense Policy

Fellow

Petr Tůma

Visiting Fellow

Europe Center

Arabic Central Europe

Further reading

Experts react Aug 18, 2021

Experts react: What the fall of Afghanistan means for Europe

By Atlantic Council experts

As policymakers in Washington grapple with the stark reality of losing Afghanistan, their counterparts across Europe are no less flummoxed over what happens next. Will Brussels be as ready to support future American foreign policy initiatives?

Afghanistan Conflict

New Atlanticist Jun 14, 2021

Misunderstanding and underestimating Europe

By Olivier-Rémy Bel

Europe has changed. It has started—though only started—transforming into a global geopolitical player. The urgent task before Europe is to finish that transition.

China European Union

Event Recap May 25, 2021

Mali coup: White House official calls for ‘unconditional and immediate’ release of president and prime minister

By Africa Center

Speaking at the Atlantic Council’s Africa Day celebration, White House official Dana Banks responded to topical issues in African affairs, including the coup in Mali, calling for “the unconditional and immediate release of the president and the prime minister.”

Africa Democratic Transitions

The post A cable from Mali: How to bring Bamako back from the brink appeared first on Atlantic Council.

Africa Center Distinguished Fellow Ambassador J. Peter Pham, former US Special Envoy for the Sahel Region as well as former US Special Envoy for the Great Lakes Region of Africa, moderated the conversation, opening with a discussion on the evolution of Prof. Autesserre’s distinguished career from identifying flaws in international peacebuilding norms and practices to offering an alternative localized solution, noting that her often provocative work has influenced policy discussions at some of the highest levels in international organizations and governments.  

In Prof. Autesserre’s remarks, she highlighted the need to move peacebuilding away from the traditional practices of premature elections and a focus on elite-bargaining, towards a process that is locally led and prioritizes local definitions of peace, democracy, and justice. She also spoke of the growing support for localized peace processes but noted that international organizations often merely “talk the talk” when it comes to supporting genuinely locally driven peace processes.

Prof. Autesserre also engaged on the role of locally led peace processes in Idjwi (DRC), Somaliland, and lessons that can be brought from these contexts to the United Nations Multidimensional Integrated Stabilization Mission in Mali (​MINUSMA), whose annual mandate renews on June 30 and which Amb. Pham noted, has “found progress difficult to come by” despite the “billions of dollars spent since 2013 and the hundreds of lives lost, making MINUSMA the deadliest ‘peacekeeping’ mission in the world today.”

Further reading

Event Recap May 25, 2021

Mali coup: White House official calls for ‘unconditional and immediate’ release of president and prime minister

By Africa Center

Speaking at the Atlantic Council’s Africa Day celebration, White House official Dana Banks responded to topical issues in African affairs, including the coup in Mali, calling for “the unconditional and immediate release of the president and the prime minister.”

Africa Democratic Transitions

Event Recap Apr 13, 2021

Reflecting on the Bring Back Our Girls movement

By Africa Center

On Tuesday, April 13, the Africa Center convened a private event with Wall Street Journal reporters Joe Parkinson and Drew Hinshaw for a discussion of their recently published investigative book Bring Back Our Girls, chronicling the infamous abduction of the Chibok schoolgirls in 2014 and the resultant social media-driven advocacy campaign and international response.

Africa Extremism

New Atlanticist May 25, 2021

Linda Thomas-Greenfield on Africa’s most overlooked crises and opportunities

By Katherine Walla

Thomas-Greenfield spoke about US President Joe Biden’s outlook on Africa with Ambassador Rama Yade, director of the Atlantic Council’s Africa Center, at an event celebrating Africa Day and introducing the Africa Center’s new team and mission.

Africa Crisis Management

The post Prof. Séverine Autesserre says that it’s time for the peacekeeping community to ‘walk the walk’ when it comes to localized peacebuilding appeared first on Atlantic Council.

Banks told the director of the Atlantic Council’s Africa Center, Ambassador Rama Yade, that “Instability in Mali leads to greater instability in the Sahel. I think this makes the case for why we have to work together with like-minded partners in the region to ensure that stability is maintained.”

Banks highlighted Africa’s place in Biden administration foreign policy amid a broader strategy of global reengagement and relations rooted in mutual respect. She said that Africa’s importance goes well beyond strategic competition with China, and instead put forth a vision of “Africa not as a continent or as a problem to be solved, but rather a partner engaging in mutual respect.”

When asked about the pandemic and debt relief, Banks said “When you talk about economic recovery from the COVID-19 pandemic, we stand ready to partner with African countries to ensure that they are rebuilding their economies through various methods. One tool that we have in our toolbox is Prosper Africa,” referring to the United States’ existing flagship commercial policy. She went on to say that the administration is finding ways to give Prosper Africa “the teeth” it needs to succeed, while hinting at forthcoming US programs in support of Africa’s digital economy and the African Continental Free Trade Area.

Ambassador of the African Union to the United States Hilda Suka-Mafudze sounded similar notes of collaboration in her remarks, pointing to the US government’s strong bipartisan support for Africa. “I strongly believe that all the stars are aligned today to take US-Africa relations to a higher and strategic level of engagement for the best interests of both sides,” she said. Suka-Mafudze highlighted the African Union’s 2021 theme of “Arts, Culture, and Heritage,” affirming the creative industries’ ability to support sustainable job creation and social inclusion.  

Banks, too, underlined how “culture has always been a wonderful way to connect” and that cultural connections “will continue and have always been one of the bedrocks of our engagement with Africa.”

Atlantic Council Executive Chairman Emeritus Gen. James L. Jones Jr. opened the session by saying Africa Day—which commemorates the founding of the African Union’s predecessor in 1963—represents a moment of optimism as well as reflection. He added that, “We are reminded of the importance of multilateral institutions and the important role that the African Union has played in the continent’s political and economic development and its global relationships.” Also joining the conversation with Banks were Africa Center fellows Didier Acouetey, Abdoul Salam Bello, Cameron Hudson, and Aubrey Hruby, as well as Africa Center partner Admassu Tadesse, the group managing director and CEO of the Eastern and Southern African Trade and Development Bank.

The session closed with Yade bringing the conversation back to Banks’ personal ties to the continent, for a discussion of building bridges between cultures and diasporas. Reflecting on her connection and fascination with the continent, Banks said “I know that there are many other African Americans who feel the same and that’s who we would like to work with, the diaspora, to get them to become more engaged economically as well as culturally with the continent because it makes for stronger policy.”

Missed the event? Watch the webcast below and engage us @ACAfricaCenter with any questions, comments, or feedback.  

Further reading:

Event Recap May 25, 2021

Mali coup: White House official calls for ‘unconditional and immediate’ release of president and prime minister

By Africa Center

Speaking at the Atlantic Council’s Africa Day celebration, White House official Dana Banks responded to topical issues in African affairs, including the coup in Mali, calling for “the unconditional and immediate release of the president and the prime minister.”

Africa Democratic Transitions

Event Recap Apr 13, 2021

Reflecting on the Bring Back Our Girls movement

By Africa Center

On Tuesday, April 13, the Africa Center convened a private event with Wall Street Journal reporters Joe Parkinson and Drew Hinshaw for a discussion of their recently published investigative book Bring Back Our Girls, chronicling the infamous abduction of the Chibok schoolgirls in 2014 and the resultant social media-driven advocacy campaign and international response.

Africa Extremism

New Atlanticist May 25, 2021

Linda Thomas-Greenfield on Africa’s most overlooked crises and opportunities

By Katherine Walla

Thomas-Greenfield spoke about US President Joe Biden’s outlook on Africa with Ambassador Rama Yade, director of the Atlantic Council’s Africa Center, at an event celebrating Africa Day and introducing the Africa Center’s new team and mission.

Africa Crisis Management

The post Mali coup: White House official calls for ‘unconditional and immediate’ release of president and prime minister appeared first on Atlantic Council.

During the discussion, panelists laid out the current situation in Chad, reflecting on the poor condition of the army, the potential for further armed rebellions to form, and the implications for political bargaining in a country where many institutions are organized on ethnic lines. Natolban gave a clear warning that if Chad continues on its current course of repressive rule, there is a potential for mass atrocities to be committed. He emphasized the Chadian people’s desire for peace, freedom, and democracy, to be produced by a civilian transition free from external interference.

The discussion brought forth a variety of options for engagement. Strictly military solutions were ruled out, along with acceding to a purely military transition as currently configured. Pressure will have to be put on the transitional military council to see what concessions can be extracted, and international actors will also have to hold each other accountable as, for example, many questioned the role of France.   

Natolban closed with a reminder that any action must take into account the reality for Chadians, echoing Amb. Yade’s comment that it should be Chadians that define their country’s future. At present, Chadians view the actions of FACT rebels as helping to unseat the vestiges of the previous regime, but all agreed that some type of National Dialogue was essential for charting a way of out rebellion and laying the foundations for national reconciliation and a more democratic transition. The Atlantic Council is proud to convene on the subject of Chad and the broader Sahel region, and will continue to be a platform for commentary and analysis in the coming months.  

Further reading:

Event Recap May 25, 2021

Mali coup: White House official calls for ‘unconditional and immediate’ release of president and prime minister

By Africa Center

Speaking at the Atlantic Council’s Africa Day celebration, White House official Dana Banks responded to topical issues in African affairs, including the coup in Mali, calling for “the unconditional and immediate release of the president and the prime minister.”

Africa Democratic Transitions

Event Recap Apr 13, 2021

Reflecting on the Bring Back Our Girls movement

By Africa Center

On Tuesday, April 13, the Africa Center convened a private event with Wall Street Journal reporters Joe Parkinson and Drew Hinshaw for a discussion of their recently published investigative book Bring Back Our Girls, chronicling the infamous abduction of the Chibok schoolgirls in 2014 and the resultant social media-driven advocacy campaign and international response.

Africa Extremism

New Atlanticist May 25, 2021

Linda Thomas-Greenfield on Africa’s most overlooked crises and opportunities

By Katherine Walla

Thomas-Greenfield spoke about US President Joe Biden’s outlook on Africa with Ambassador Rama Yade, director of the Atlantic Council’s Africa Center, at an event celebrating Africa Day and introducing the Africa Center’s new team and mission.

Africa Crisis Management

The post Charting a course in Chad: Implications and analysis appeared first on Atlantic Council.

While perhaps of little thought to most Americans, Chad, three times the size of the state of California, sits at the crossroads of most major conflicts in Africa where the United States currently has a security interest, if not an actual operational presence.

To Chad’s east, the United States has invested heavily over the last decade in the political and humanitarian response in Darfur and more recently as part of the national transition effort in Sudan; to the north, the United States has played a leading role in ending the Libyan civil war and attempting to return a measure of stability a decade after Gaddafi’s death plunged the region into conflict; to the south, the fight against Boko Haram is the central preoccupation; while the United States has been perhaps most involved in responding to manifold threats from jihadist groups in the Sahel region to Chad‘s west, including through the establishment of a drone base, support to United Nations peacekeeping, and the deployment of special forces combat troops. 

From the Mediterranean to the Gulf of Guinea and from the Red Sea to the Atlantic, all roads on these security axes run through Chad and for the past decade or more depended in no small part on the military prowess of its fallen leader, Idriss Déby.

Déby’s unique ability to respond to, manage, and in many ways shape these conflicts was a testament to both his strategic vision and his battlefield acumen. In life, and now in death, it earned him the admiration and respect of his neighbors and global powers, as reflected in the outpouring of genuine praise and mourning at his passing.

Mali, perhaps most rife with instability and dependent upon Chad’s security involvement, declared three days of national mourning for Déby, while Nigeria’s Foreign Minister cautioned that, “His demise could lead to vacuums that could implode in these subregions.” But no expression of grief was as personal and as heartfelt as from France’s President Emmanuel Macron, who said, “Chad is losing a great soldier and a President who has worked tirelessly for the security of the country and the stability of the region for three decades. France loses a courageous friend.”

Less fondly remembered is the way he managed his own country: brutally, corruptly, and vengefully; an old school African strongman who as recently as the campaign last month for his sixth term as president harassed, intimidated, jailed, and even killed his opposition opponents and their family members. He was a killer who brought order and discipline to an unstable region, but imposed fear, poverty, and misery on his own people. In his wake, he leaves a legacy of ashes, at home and across the region; and among his opponents, both real and imagined.

But his greatest personal achievement—glossed over in all the homilies and testimonials—his ability to cling to power for thirty years, was in retrospect pyrrhic for the nation he leaves behind. Chad today is little more than a collection of fractious tribal fiefdoms and hollowed out institutions, underpinned by abject poverty and a corrupt patronage system of tribal elites, all of which are exacerbated by a diffuse network of simmering rebellions that could well tear apart the meager remnants of what he left behind.

These painful facts have been known to all of Déby’s security partners across the region and beyond for years. But for so long it was easier to turn a blind eye to his domestic autocratic realities which were accepted as being in service to his significant regional security contributions. But in his death that strategy is no longer tenable, as much as some may still like it to be. And the international community’s forbearance and ignorance of the country’s unravelling is now its own to manage if it hopes to maintain any semblance of the regional order that Déby helped to impose.

France, the former colonial power, and the country whose security relations and bonhomie with Déby are in fact the most externally responsible for the country’s deleterious state, has not missed the opportunity to once again intervene, if not militarily, then behind the scenes to ensure a soft-landing for its interests. In his eulogy, speaking as Deby’s “loyal friend and ally,” President Macron warned the FACT rebels and other armed opponents that, “France will not let anybody put into question or threaten today or tomorrow Chad’s stability and integrity.”

But unlike in decades past, where Washington was content to view Chad as ‘a French problem,’ Washington’s regional security interests are today equally as bound to what unfolds in Chad. The massive US political and financial support to neighboring Sudan’s transition could easily be upended from an implosion in Chad. So too could all US efforts in rolling back the spread of jihadism from the Sahel to the Mediterranean to the Red Sea. Washington’s blood and treasure extend across the region and it can neither afford to sit out the conversation on what comes next in Chad nor subcontract its involvement to other powers with presumably more at stake. France’s parachuting in to N’Djamena last week and its early endorsement of the military transition should not constrain Washington from finding its own voice and using what influence it has to help lay the foundations for more than just a soft landing.

Indeed, in the midst of the fast-moving changes there is an opportunity to not only ensure that long-term security interests in the region are met, but to also take immediate steps to begin to address the kinds of massive democracy and development deficits that have left Chad so enervated today. It is a view that has already been espoused by the incoming Biden administration.

As Washington contemplates its next steps, there are a few actions it should prioritize:

Listen to Chadians. Under Déby, Chadian civil society was kept intentionally weak, divided, and fearful, and so observers should not expect to see the kind of organized, popular uprising that swept neighboring despot Omar al-Bashir from power in Sudan two years ago to emerge in Chad. But that does not mean Chadians lack a vision of their own future and a voice to express it. 

Indeed, late last week a collection of more than five dozen Chadian political and civil society organizations released a joint statement calling for, “Respect for the constitution and the immediate establishment of a civilian transition; demand from the military a return to the constitutional order; the suspension of hostilities between the Chadian armed forces and armed groups; and the immediate opening of a national consultation with all political forces, civil society, armed groups and institutions of the Republic to initiate inclusive institutional and political reforms with a view to ensuring the stability, peace and development of Chad.”

These legitimate demands should serve as the guiding political framework for moving forward. The fact that Chad’s new military government has already rejected talk of a ceasefire and political dialogue, and is maintaining and extending Idriss Déby’s public ban on public protests, suggests that the marginal political space is about to close even further. As such, Washington’s explicit endorsement of civilian demands would not only lend legitimacy to this nascent collection of civil society actors seeking to gain their footing, but would begin to reorient years of US engagement away from Chad’s security apparatus towards an emerging civilian dispensation.  

Engage the African Union. It should go without saying that in the year 2021, the former colonial power should not be picking winners and losers nor deciding the fate of the population for another generation of Chadians. There is no greater or more substantial voice that should be leading the international response to the now-coup and crisis in Chad than the principal regional organization. But while the international response should have an African face, it has been complicated in Chad by the African Union (AU) Commission’s own Chairperson, Moussa Faki Mahamat. 

A Chadian and former prime minister and foreign minister under the late Chadian leader, Faki made a “private visit” to his home capital, N’Djamena, the day after Déby’s death and the installation of Déby’s son as commander of the extra-constitutional Transitional Military Council. Even in his private capacity, Faki’s presence signaled to Chadians an acknowledgment and tacit support for the illegal transfer of power in his country. For this reason, Washington ought to push privately to see him recuse himself from further direct involvement in the crisis.

Fortunately, soon after Faki’s visit, the AU’s Peace and Security Commission stepped in with a roadmap of its own, calling for Chad, “to respect the constitutional order. . . quickly engage in a process of restoration of the constitutional order and the transfer of political power to civil authorities.” The statement also alluded to the potential coercive power of AU membership suspension and economic sanctions if the constitutional order is not promptly restored. Adding to the African-led effort, the presidents of Niger and Mauritania, coalition members of the G5 Sahel Initiative, have also seemed to step into a mediating role when late last week in consultations with Chad’s political opposition they cited, “the need for a dialogue to set up transitional institutions that will be responsible for drafting a new constitution and organizing elections.” At the same time, Niger has also been asked, and agreed, to work with Chad’s new junta to hunt down and arrest fleeing FACT fighters who may be seeking refuge in Niger, further complicating the regional role to ultimately support a transition to civilian rule.

African mediators have now floated the model of the kind of civil-military power-sharing arrangement seen most recently in Mali after its latest coup and in Sudan after the popular uprising there, both of which Washington endorsed previously and worked to ensure were implemented. Endorsing this approach and committing to its success would give Washington a seat at the table and help position it on the right side of the history being written in Chad.

Put “loafers on the ground.”  While statements from Washington have their place, there is no alternative to on-the-ground diplomatic engagement. Here, Washington is at a severe disadvantage compared to virtually everyone else with a stake in the outcome in Chad. One of the Trump administration’s most neglectful legacies was keeping US embassies understaffed and nowhere is this omission felt today more than in N’Djamena where the United States has been without an ambassador for nearly three years, resulting in a disadvantaged position in its use of influence to engage civilians, politicians, rebels, and military leaders alike. Even prior to this moment, so absent was US diplomacy that in the past three months of the country’s flawed presidential campaign, the US embassy did not issue a single statement of concern over its conduct or in solidarity with the beleaguered opposition as they were harassed and intimidated into submission. US credibility with and access to those negotiating for power is now no doubt severely constrained as a result of overall diplomatic absence. 

But Washington can begin to make up for this neglect through the immediate reappointment of a US Special Envoy for the Sahel Region of Africa. This position, created under Trump and ably filled by my colleague Ambassador J. Peter Pham, should not only serve as a point person in ensuring that US security partners across the region are consulted and coordinated, but the envoy must now also serve as the country’s diplomatic point person inside of Chad, representing a broader set of US objectives in support of a peaceful, democratic transition. Reappointing a special envoy would reinvigorate a sclerotic diplomatic approach at the very moment it is needed most.

Act immediately; think strategically. Lastly, while the United States must move quickly to help define a framework that will avoid new violence and create the conditions for a stable transition, it would be a mistake and a missed opportunity to view developments in Chad in a vacuum. Washington should instead recognize the voluminous criticism being leveled at its ‘whack-a-mole’ securitized approach to engagement across the Sahel region to rethink and reset its agenda across the wider region. The recent successful democratic transition in neighboring Niger is a starting point. So too is recent helpful research from the likes of colleagues at the Center for Strategic and International Studies and Chatham House, among many others, all of whom argue for, inter alia, investments in human security, improved governance, a focus on state-building and service delivery, and more intentional engagement with local actors versus political and military elites. All of these are in desperate need in Chad today.

Cameron Hudson is a senior fellow at the Atlantic Council’s Africa Center. Previously he served as the chief of staff to the special envoy for Sudan and as director for African Affairs on the National Security Council in the George W. Bush administration. Follow him on Twitter @_hudsonc.

Further reading

Fast Thinking Apr 20, 2021

FAST THINKING: After the death of its president, Chad is on the brink

By Atlantic Council

After three decades in power, Chadian President Idriss Déby was killed following clashes with insurgents, state media announced Tuesday. What’s next for the country after the fall of its long-ruling autocrat?

Africa Crisis Management

Report Apr 19, 2021

Priorities for US-Africa commercial policy in the Biden Administration

By Aubrey Hruby

This new decade has created a unique moment for the Biden administration to reset US-Africa policy. A more multifaceted and nuanced engagement with African states will set a foundation for stronger US-Africa partnerships, support mutual economic growth, and contribute to strengthening US global leadership.

Africa Economy & Business

AfricaSource Apr 23, 2021

Climate change will not be fixed without Africa

By Rama Yade

When Congolese President Félix Tshisekedi spoke at the virtual Leaders Summit on Climate this week, he had the force of the continent behind him. And his message was that developed countries must do more. As the summit comes to a close, the world still has so much to learn from Africa about how to tackle the climate crisis—if the world would only listen.

Africa Climate Change & Climate Action

The post Washington’s role and responsibility in Chad appeared first on Atlantic Council.

What is Chad’s strategic significance?

Chad sits strategically astride the Sahel and the Horn of Africa and has largely been viewed by Western powers as a critical state in staunching the spread of radical Islam and terrorism from the western Sahel region and as a buffer to the long-term instability coming from Sudan’s Darfur region on Chad’s eastern border. Chad shares its northern border with Libya and has been seen as an important part of regional strategies to stem the tide of instability emanating from its collapse since the overthrow of long-time dictator Muammar Gaddafi. 

Who is Chad’s current leader?

Chad’s leader, Marshal Idriss Déby Itno, has ruled Chad for thirty years, having overthrown his mentor and predecessor, Hissène Habré, who is himself now serving a life sentence on charges of genocide, crimes against humanity, and torture, conducted while Déby served as his army chief. Just last week, Chad held presidential elections where Déby declared, “I know in advance that I will win.” Preliminary results that are just now beginning to emerge suggest that he is right. Most outside observers agree that Déby’s re-election to a sixth six-year term is a foregone conclusion given that he disqualified fully half of the candidates who sought to unseat him; attacked, jailed, and intimidated his closest contenders; and banned campaign and protest rallies for the remaining candidates in the weeks leading up to the April 11 vote. After he changed the constitution in 2018, allowing himself an additional two terms as president, Déby could now serve until 2033, a total of forty-three years.

Déby’s efforts to undermine the opposition and hollow out civil society are both a function and a driver of his growing unpopularity in the country. Déby’s inability to turn billions of dollars in oil revenue accumulated since Chad started exporting its production through a World Bank-financed oil pipeline has emerged as a particular sore point for any Chadian not a part of Déby’s Zaghawa tribe, who have benefited the most from the corrupt patronage system that oil wealth has created. When the World Bank pulled out of the pipeline deal in 2008, its final report noted “Chad failed to comply with the key requirements of this agreement. . . The government did not allocate adequate resources critical for poverty reduction.”

What is Déby’s relationship with Western powers today?

Déby has strong ties to Washington and Paris, who for decades have largely overlooked his abysmal record of human, civil, and political rights at home because of his strength and reliability in leading military operations against common foes across the region. Déby earned his reputation as a tough-as-nails military tactician during the decade of Chad’s wars with Libya in the 1980s, leading one of the few African armies to successfully beat back Libyan influence and incursions. 

Trained in France as a pilot and in military tactics, Déby in recent years earned admiration and respect for his role in France’s Operation Barkhane and the broader G5 Sahel initiative, a US, European, and African security mission deployed primarily across Mali, Niger, and Burkina Faso to roll back the terrorist threat there. Déby has been equally active in neighboring Nigeria in combatting Boko Haram elements and even famously complained to the New York Times about “a definite deficit of coordination, and a lack of common action” from the Nigerian army in the fight. Déby’s main political opponent, Saleh Kebzabo, who boycotted last week’s presidential election, has described Déby’s relations with the West the most succinctly, “They’ve found someone to do their dirty work. Then, they close their eyes.”

Beyond “dirty work,” Déby has also sought to disarm his Western critics through other relations of convenience. He has ingratiated himself with a generation of French military officers who have at some point in their careers cycled through the French airbase now constituting the largest French presence on the continent and representing the most visible remaining vestige of the Françafrique relations that emerged after African independence that ensured that France’s former colonies remained in a cozy French orbit through a not-so-secretive web of interlocking political, economic, and military ties binding French and African elites. Most significantly, France intervened militarily to ensure Déby’s hold on power when in February 2019 French Mirage fighter jets were dispatched from France’s airbase on the outskirts of N’Djamena to destroy a column of advancing rebels, doubling down on France’s commitment to the autocrat.

Washington, too, along with other European powers, have benefitted from Déby’s strategic decisions. Serving as host to more than a million Darfuri refugees in Chad’s far eastern region for more than a decade, Déby financed much of the relief operation there and allowed Western humanitarian organizations, human rights observers, and journalists ready access to his country to investigate atrocity crimes within Darfuri refugee camps there and as a staging ground into Darfur during the years of Sudan’s genocide against African Darfuris. Similarly, he dispatched his troops to Libya in support of Western efforts to install Khalifa Haftar and his Libyan National Army when that was still the policy, and has been the beneficiary of European Union (EU) and member state funding to crack down on the human trafficking and illegal migration routes stopping migrants before they arrive in Libya to embark for European shores.

What is the current situation on the ground?

It is hard to assess the current threat to Déby given conflicting reports that are emerging from the region and the remoteness of the landscape the rebels are currently crossing. What we do know is that as many as one hundred vehicles and perhaps five hundred or more anti-Déby rebels from Chad’s Front for Alternation and Concord in Chad (FACT) crossed back into Chad on Sunday, April 11. Despite a government announcement that the “terrorists have been routed,” subsequent rebel statements have claimed the downing of two Chadian MiG-21s and an army helicopter, the seizing of several army armories and by Saturday, April 17 a claim of control over the entire region of Kanem, which at its southern point is only 150 kilometers from N’Djamena and nearly 1,000 kilometers south of the Libyan border from where they entered Chad.

FACT rebels in their statements have sought to put anxious observers at ease. They have invited Chadian soldiers to “serve the nation” by joining their rebellion, all the while attempting to reassure Chadian “citizens and Chad’s external partners” that the rebellion intends to ensure their safety and security and that of the country’s borders, while also continuing to support Chad’s external security commitments, presumably meaning under Operation Barkhane. Thus far, FACT appears to be avoiding any urban areas and there have been few reports of civilian casualties. In fact, Déby’s deep unpopularity, as demonstrated by the country’s bleak economic outlook (still ranking 187 out of 189 countries on the UN Human Development Index despite earning billions in oil revenues) and recent lower voter turnout rates, suggest that the FACT could well be successful in tapping into pent up frustration from within the military and civilian ranks.

What are the implications for the region if Déby were to fall?

Déby’s fall at this time would send shockwaves from the Red Sea to the Atlantic. Its most immediate impact would be on the multinational G5 Sahel initiative, to which the United States and France are the most substantial contributors. However, as violence has only continued to rise after ten years of combat operations and both countries’ publics continue to question the goals and values of having their forces deployed in remote regions whose direct security threat to national interests seems equally remote, the possible loss of the leading African element could cause Paris and Washington to fundamentally rethink their involvement. Many have begun to argue that the military component of the Sahelian response operation has been a failure for the West anyway and what is really needed is development assistance, institution strengthening, service delivery, and civil society engagement—ironically, all of which Chad itself requires.

Less well known but as significant has been Déby’s increasing involvement in recent instability in the neighboring Darfur region of Sudan. Sudanese media attribute the recent uptick in violence in the West Darfur capital of Geneina between Arab and African tribes to Déby’s arming of Masalit and Zaghawa tribesmen in the absence of United Nations peacekeepers. His departure from the scene would remove a perennial source of instability inside Darfur, but at the same time would deny the leader of Sudan’s Rapid Support Forces, General Mohamed Hamdan “Hemedti” Dagalo, a key Zaghawa ally to whom Hemedti had reportedly entered into a mutual security pact last January. Without external backing, Hemedti, who has been seen as a potential Déby-like strongman in Sudan, might well temper some of his notorious ambitions, giving the fragile transition in Khartoum more time to take hold.

What to watch for?

All eyes should be on France and whether President Macron will once again fly into the defense of his friend Idriss Déby, despite Macron’s own efforts early in his time in office to distance himself from the long history of nefarious and unseemly ties between his government and multiple generations of African strongmen. In 2019, France’s national newspaper Le Monde warned that airstrikes in support of Déby made Paris “appear as the protector of a predatory and corrupt regime.” And in light of last week’s deeply flawed elections and the abhorrent treatment of the political opposition in the lead-up to the vote, such an open and self-serving embrace from Paris now could well damage Macron’s credibility even further in the lead-up to elections next year if he appears to double down on a failed military approach in the Sahel on top of a distasteful support of a notorious autocrat.

This time, however, France’s European allies who are similarly committed to the extremist fight in the Sahel as part of the G5 initiative might themselves have something to say about Paris’ continued backstopping of such an odious regime, despite its usefulness to their security mission. According to Western diplomats in the region, rumors abound that German and other Nordic contributors have warned Paris that they could well pull their support from the entire mission if France were to intervene in what they see as an internal Chadian concern.

But Paris is no doubt hoping it need not come to that. Reading the current thinking and its own public opinion, Paris is likely attempting to assist their man in N’Djamena all the while attempting to stay off the field of battle in Chad. We can be sure that France’s military and intelligence services are sharing all matter of battlefield intelligence and providing Déby the operational and logistical support necessary to stop this incursion, but are at present clearly leaving the fighting to Déby. French reports indicate that Déby is stationing tanks and other heavy armaments around the city now in anticipation of mounting a final stand from the presidential palace. This explains the evacuations of many Westerners from N’Djamena this weekend, but it does not answer the question of how Paris will respond to the dilemma it faces in Chad: ensure your preferred strongman continues his unpopular grip over your former colony or stand by while your thirty-year investment in Idriss Déby is washed away and a new approach to security in the Sahel is foisted upon you. The implications for French and US security policy are likely to be felt for years to come.

Cameron Hudson is a senior fellow at the Atlantic Council’s Africa Center. Previously he served as the chief of staff to the special envoy for Sudan and as director for African Affairs on the National Security Council in the George W. Bush administration. Follow him on Twitter @_hudsonc.

Further reading

Fast Thinking Apr 20, 2021

FAST THINKING: After the death of its president, Chad is on the brink

By Atlantic Council

After three decades in power, Chadian President Idriss Déby was killed following clashes with insurgents, state media announced Tuesday. What’s next for the country after the fall of its long-ruling autocrat?

Africa Crisis Management

Report Apr 19, 2021

Priorities for US-Africa commercial policy in the Biden Administration

By Aubrey Hruby

This new decade has created a unique moment for the Biden administration to reset US-Africa policy. A more multifaceted and nuanced engagement with African states will set a foundation for stronger US-Africa partnerships, support mutual economic growth, and contribute to strengthening US global leadership.

Africa Economy & Business

AfricaSource Apr 23, 2021

Climate change will not be fixed without Africa

By Rama Yade

When Congolese President Félix Tshisekedi spoke at the virtual Leaders Summit on Climate this week, he had the force of the continent behind him. And his message was that developed countries must do more. As the summit comes to a close, the world still has so much to learn from Africa about how to tackle the climate crisis—if the world would only listen.

Africa Climate Change & Climate Action

The post Will events in Chad force a reset of Sahel strategy? appeared first on Atlantic Council.

The first session, viewable here, focused on external influence in the Red Sea region. Africa Center Director of Programs and Studies Ms. Bronwyn Bruton moderated the panel, which included Africa Center Senior Fellow Mr. Gabriel Negatu, alongside PCNS International Relations Specialist Ms. Maha Skah and PCNS Senior Fellow Dr. Khalid Chegraoui. The event served as an opportunity to highlight the role of foreign actors in multiple arenas across the region, including in negotiations over the Grand Ethiopian Renaissance Dam (GERD), the conflict in Ethiopia’s Tigray region, the lifting of Sudan from the US state sponsors of terrorism list, and maritime trade diplomacy, among other topics.

Dr. Chegraoui gave opening remarks by providing a comprehensive overview of how emerging powers—such as the Gulf countries, Turkey, Iran, and others—are wielding influence in different parts of the region, and how the new relations between Israel and Arab states could create a new security dynamic in East Africa. Mr. Negatu then followed up by discussing how the situation in Ethiopia marks the beginning of a post-TPLF-dominated Ethiopia, which creates the opportunity for an Ethiopia-Eritrea alliance that could redefine the region’s outlook. Though an inward-looking trend in Ethiopia, as the country reconstructs and rehabilitates the Tigray region, could open the Horn to further strategic competition as external powers look to capitalize. Lastly, Ms. Skah reflected on the role of Emirati port building, Turkey’s enhanced commercial role in Somalia, and how Horn countries are essential to Israel’s commercial and strategic interests, creating an impetus for further engagement. Ms. Bruton concluded the discussion by striking a hopeful tone that the shifting regional security arrangement will bring newfound economic prosperity to countries in the region.

The second session, viewable here, zeroed in on the Sahel region, another geostrategic flashpoint where external powers are wielding influence. PCNS Senior Fellow Dr. Khalid Chegraoui moderated the panel, which included Africa Center Senior Fellows Dr. Pierre Englebert and Mr. Abdoul Salam Bello alongside PCNS Senior Fellow Mr. Rida Lyammouri. The event presented an opportunity to discuss the ongoing security situation in the region, how local, state, and regional governments are responding, and the role foreign actors are playing in the military and economic spheres.

Mr. Bello opened his remarks by framing the conversation around population growth trends and how they are putting pressure on Sahel countries to provide basic services to their population. The role of state governments is weakened by their inability to provide security, education, healthcare, and jobs, creating a void for non-state actors—including prominent terrorist groups—to gain legitimacy by providing some basic services to populations in rural areas. Dr. Englebert then followed up by emphasizing how foreign military interventions in the region, such as France’s Operation Barkhane, are band-aid solutions to the structural crisis posed by weak state institutions. Dr. Englebert suggested short and long-term solutions to improve security and governance in the region, both of which include granting more agency and capacity to African institutions rather than relying on external powers. Mr. Lyammouri reiterated these points by emphasizing that international solutions to address the Sahelian crisis have largely failed, contributing to a pervasive sense of mistrust between citizens and state governments.

Dr. Chegraoui then stepped in to pose various questions to the panelists around where external powers—namely China, Russia, and the United States—are engaged in the region, if France can remain the major external player in the Sahel, and how the COVID-19 pandemic may affect humanitarian efforts. Dr. Chegraoui concluded the discussion by thanking the panelists and expressing his hope further collaboration between the Africa Center and PCNS.

AfricaSource Dec 14, 2020

What Sudan’s terror delisting really means

The announcement today that the forty-five day notification period to Congress had elapsed and Sudan was finally off the US State Sponsors of Terrorism list is historic. It validates the new direction of the country, which it was set upon nearly two years ago by nationwide, peaceful street protests. More importantly, it represents a definitive break with Sudan’s troubled past—the true end of the Bashir era, which began more than thirty years ago—and holds out the hope for a more prosperous future for all Sudanese. The weight of the moment cannot be understated.

Africa Democratic Transitions

New Atlanticist Dec 8, 2020

Mo Ibrahim: Why Africa must emerge more resilient from the COVID crisis

By David A. Wemer

A well-known Afro-optimist, Ibrahim has invested in the continent’s democratic progress and has focused on tackling practical governance issues. While the pandemic has exposed such problems across the world, he noted, one of its lessons is that Africa must be “more self-sufficient” and “resilient.”

Africa Coronavirus

AfricaSource Dec 9, 2020

Startup Acts are the next form of policy innovation in Africa

By Jordan Wolken

Africa’s COVID recession certainly hasn’t hit the continent’s tech industry. In fact, as countries adapt to the expanding digital universe created by COVID-19, technology ecosystems across the continent are booming—and global investors have noticed. Attempting to cash in, African countries are trying to bolster their own innovation ecosystems through supportive legislation.

Africa Economy & Business

The post Fighting for influence in Africa: Report launch events held with the Policy Center for the New South appeared first on Atlantic Council.

The post Bello in Deutsche Welle: Pour une meilleure santé africaine appeared first on Atlantic Council.

The post Englebert quoted in Voice of America on the effects of COVID-19 on conflict-ridden regions appeared first on Atlantic Council.

The post Bello in WATHI: Femmes du Sahel, femmes d’Afrique, femmes Atlas appeared first on Atlantic Council.

The post Bello quoted in Le Point Afrique on the G5 Sahel Summit in Nouakchott appeared first on Atlantic Council.

In his remarks, Thiaw outlined the challenges imposed by land degradation and desertification in the Sahel, identifying migration, family separation, and heightened farmer-herder conflict among the direct consequences. Optimistically, though, he also spoke of positive paradoxes, noting that arable land and water endowments in the Sahel are more favorable than often reported, and that renewable energy has the potential to ease the power generation deficit in the region. Thiaw went on to discuss the prospects for two bold cooperative conservation initiatives: the 3S Initiative aimed at setting the region on a path toward security, stability, and sustainability, and the Great Green Wall, established to restore land from Senegal to Djibouti. A crosscutting theme was leveraging local culture and language, highlighted by the UNCCD’s engagement with local musicians to deliver messages that resonate in the communities affected.

Africa Center Director of Programs and Studies and Deputy Director Ms. Bronwyn Bruton moderated the ensuing discussion, during which participants engaged Mr. Thiaw on the political willingness of Sahelian governments to combat climate change and desertification, the role for civil society, the security dimension, and the limiting factors surrounding the role of the private sector.

The post UN Under-Secretary-General speaks to the complexity of countering desertification appeared first on Atlantic Council.

The post Yade joins Jury du Dimanche to discuss politics in France, Senegal, and the Sahel appeared first on Atlantic Council.

The post McFate quoted in the New York Times on plans to cut back US intelligence efforts in Africa appeared first on Atlantic Council.

This article first appeared in Wathi. The original article can be found here.

Les activités commerciales liées au pastoralisme en Afrique représentent environ un volume de l’ordre du milliard de dollars par an et entre 10 et 44% du produit intérieur brut (PIB) des pays africains. Au total, près d’ 1,3 milliard de personnes bénéficient de la chaîne de valeur du bétail.

Le pastoralisme est une source de richesse considérable créatrice d’emplois et de valeur, y compris des interdépendances économiques fortes avec les agriculteurs. En Afrique de l’Est, plus 75% des troupeaux bovins au Kenya et 90% de ceux de Tanzanie sont détenus par des éleveurs. En Éthiopie, le pastoralisme fait vivre environ 20 millions de personnes et représente 80% de la production annuelle laitière. Il fournit 90% de la viande consommée en Afrique de l’Est et contribue pour 19%, 13% et 8% du PIB en Éthiopie, au Kenya et en Ouganda.

Au Sahel, on estime que plus de 50 millions de personnes dépendent du pastoralisme. Sur le plan alimentaire, 65% de la viande et 70% du lait vendus sur les marchés locaux proviennent de systèmes pastoraux. Au Mali, l’élevage transhumant et nomade représente environ 70 à 80% du cheptel national.

Le pastoralisme menacé par l’insécurité 

En dépit de leurs contributions aux économies nationales et régionales, les éleveurs pâtissent, dans nombre de pays, de représentations simplistes et négatives (sociale/traditionnelle, sécuritaire, mais surtout environnementale), et subissent des préjugés liés à leur mode de vie.

Ces préjugés et tensions ne datent pas d’aujourd’hui. Déjà au début du XXe siècle, les phénomènes de transhumance étaient qualifiés de désordre, voire de mouvements de va-et vient qui empêchent tout contrôle par les administrateurs coloniaux. Les Etats hérités de la colonisation, dans de nombreux cas, n’ont pas été à même de mieux inclure le pastoralisme dans les agendas nationaux de développement. Ceci a conduit à la détérioration des rapports anciens et à l’érosion du contrat social traditionnel qui a toujours existé entre les communautés fondé sur les différentiels agroécologiques et démographiques.

Depuis les indépendances, ces conflits se déroulent dans un contexte de dégradation des terres et de changement climatique qui affectent la disponibilité des terres arables pour l’agriculture et des zones de pâturages pour l’élevage et l’accès à l’eau. Dans la zone sahélienne, ce sont 80% des terres de culture qui sont dégradées. La disponibilité limitée des terres cultivables amène l’agriculture à se développer sur des terres traditionnellement utilisées par les éleveurs, intensifiant la concurrence entre les producteurs de bétail et les producteurs de produits agricoles et générant des conflits.

On estime que 60 à 70% des personnes déplacées, qu’il s’agisse de réfugiés internes ou de réfugiés, sont des éleveurs originaires du Sahel et de la Corne de l’Afrique, où la variabilité climatique constitue un obstacle majeur à la réalisation de la sécurité alimentaire et à la réduction de la pauvreté dans les zones pastorales.

Dans la région du Lac Tchad, des axes de transhumances ne sont plus accessibles du fait des exactions de Boko Haram et de l’insécurité résiduelle. La région est une des zones les plus affectées par le changement climatique. Le Lac Tchad, dont dépendent environ 30 millions de personnes, a enregistré une réduction de sa surface de 90% au cours des 50 dernières années. L’évaporation des eaux est source des conflits pour l’accès aux terres. La fermeture de certaines zones frontalières de la région (Nigéria, Niger, Tchad, Cameroun) force les éleveurs à réorganiser leur mobilité vers d’autres destinations au sein des pays accroissant ainsi la pression pastorale, augmentant les coûts d’accès à l’eau et au fourrage et affaiblissant les animaux. Dans la région de Diffa, au Niger, 30 pour cent des animaux ont été touchés par la fermeture des frontières et la perturbation des flux de transhumance.

Au-delà même des questions d’accès liées aux conflits, la mobilité (inhérente au pastoralisme) est affectée par les phénomènes des frontières. En 1998, la CEDEAO a adopté une décision visant à encadrer et faciliter les transhumances transfrontalières qui est difficilement mise en œuvre sur le terrain.

Pastoralisme et adaptation face aux changements climatiques

Les effets liés aux changements climatiques constituent les principales menaces aux activités du pastoralisme. En Afrique de l’Ouest et au Sahel, les températures moyennes à la surface du sol ont nettement augmenté au cours des 50 dernières années. Il est probable que ces températures à la surface du sol augmenteront plus vite que la moyenne mondiale. Au Sahel, on estime que les températures devraient augmenter 1,5 fois plus vite que la moyenne mondiale.

D’un autre côté, selon une récente étude de la Banque mondiale, la raréfaction en eau exacerbée par le changement climatique, pourrait affecter les économies et conduire certaines régions du monde telle que le Sahel à enregistrer un recul du PIB de l’ordre de 6%, provoquer des migrations et générer des conflits.

Victime et acteur du changement climatique, le pastoralisme peut faire partie des solutions. Le Groupe d’experts intergouvernemental sur l’évolution du climat (GIEC) et l’Union internationale pour la conservation de la natures (IUCN) s’accordent sur le fait que le pastoralisme est un facteur d’atténuation et d’adaptation au climat.

Ainsi, le dernier rapport du GIEC consacré au changement climatique et aux terres souligne que les techniques d’élevage pourraient contribuer au renforcement des capacités d’adaptation des communautés rurales. Le rapport du GIEC met également en exergue les synergies qui existent entre adaptation et atténuation, notamment au travers d’approches de gestion durable des terres.

De l’autre côté, l’IUCN mentionne la contribution essentielle du pastoralisme aux services environnementaux au travers du maintien du cycle de l’eau; de la régulation et la purification de l’eau; de la séquestration du carbone ; du maintien de la biodiversité et des processus écologiques ; du maintien et de la formation des sols ; ainsi que de la promotion de la croissance du pâturage.

Réussir le pastoralisme au XXIe siècle 

Nous avons une responsabilité collective de prendre à bras le corps le défi existentiel que représente l’avenir du pastoralisme au XXIe siècle. Le rôle des femmes dans le pastoralisme mérite également beaucoup plus d’attention. L’avenir du pastoralisme s’inscrit dans une vision qui lie étroitement les objectifs climatiques et environnementaux aux objectifs de développement économique et social et partant, à notre objectif commun qu’est la paix et de stabilité.

En effet, le pastoralisme, mieux intégré dans les politiques publiques et mieux financé, peut être un vecteur d’intégration et de sécurité et un fort générateur d’emplois durables et de qualité.

Naturellement, une série d’actions fortes doit être entreprise par les partie prenantes. Dans ce contexte, il est essentiel d’assurer une meilleure gestion commune des terres sachant que les politiques gouvernementales favorisant la privatisation des terres pastorales se traduisent par l’accroissement des conflits, l’appauvrissement des éleveurs, et la dégradation de l’environnement. C’est le défi que vient de relever la Convention des Nations Unies sur la lutte contre la désertification (CNULCD) de la COP 14 qui s’est tenue en Inde en ouvrant les débats sur les régimes fonciers et en proposant des solutions innovantes.

La dimension régionale est fondamentale. Dans ce contexte, les organisations régionales ont un rôle important à jouer. Par exemple, la CEDEAO a adopté en 1998 une décision pour gérer la transhumance transfrontalière. A cet égard, le travail en cours sur la gouvernance responsable du régime foncier pastoral dans la région Ouest-Africaine menée par la CEDEAO, le Comité permanent inter-États de lutte contre la sécheresse au Sahel (CILSS) et la FAO doit être soutenu et encouragé. Dans le cadre de ces travaux, la CEDEAO s’est d’ores et déjà engagée à réviser le cadre réglementaire sur la transhumance entre les pays de la CEDEAO, autorisant la mobilité et l’utilisation des points d’eau et des terres pastorales.

L’investissement privé doit être plus et mieux sollicité pour un développement des chaînes de valeur de la viande et du lait. Faute de chaîne du froid et de capacité de traitement limitée des producteurs, de grandes quantités de lait sont actuellement gaspillées. Une meilleure organisation de la filière et un développement d’instruments d’accès au crédit permettraient aux éleveurs de sortir du piège de la pauvreté et de répondre aux besoins alimentaires d’une population africaine en pleine expansion.

L’accès à l’énergie est une dimension à ne pas négliger. En particulier, l’énergie renouvelable peut avoir une application particulière dans les zones où les éleveurs dépendent des forages profonds des eaux souterraines. La nature même de du fait de la nature de l’activité pastorale, basée sur la mobilité, il y a une demande pour une technologie d’accès à l’énergie qui soit suffisamment abordable et disponible, d’une part ; facilement déployable et transportable, de l’autre côté. Rappelons que dans certains pays à forte tradition pastorale, le taux d’accès à l’électricité dans le monde rural est de moins d’1 pour cent.

Le partage du savoir est également important. En effet, il est crucial de renforcer les connaissances, de faciliter l’échange d’expériences et le partage des meilleures pratiques et des enseignements tirés de l’atténuation et de l’adaptation. A cet égard, la Convention-cadre des Nations Unies sur les changements climatiques (CCNUCC) offre une plateforme efficace de partage. Nous devons encourager une plus forte participation et un renforcement de l’engagement des communautés des éleveurs dans le processus de la CCNUCC.

Répondre à ces différents défis nécessitera la mise en place de politiques adaptées aux enjeux des éleveurs dans leurs territoires et cohérentes à l’échelle régionale mais aussi une meilleure inclusion de la voix des éleveurs comme le préconise la Convention des Nations unies sur la lutte contre la désertification (CNULCD).

Il faudra encore du temps pour que des politiques pastorales pertinents et efficaces soient pleinement opérationnelles. Le passage des textes à leur application sur le terrain est difficile. La capacité des Etats, des communautés locales doit être renforcée. A la veille de l’ouverture de la Conférence de Madrid sur les changements climatiques qui réunira les pays signataires de la Convention-cadre des Nations Unies sur les changements climatiques (CCNUCC), il est grand temps de relever le gant et ne pas oublier pas le pastoralisme dans l’agenda climatique!

Rama Yade est l’ancienne secrétaire d’Etat aux Droits de l’Homme puis aux Sports en France et senior fellow au Centre Afrique de l’Atlantic Council.

Abdoul Salam Bello est ancien directeur de cabinet à l’Agence de développement de l’Union africaine (AUDA-NEPAD). Il est également senior fellow au Centre Afrique de l’Atlantic Council.

The post N’oublions pas le pastoralisme dans l’agenda climatique appeared first on Atlantic Council.

Senior Fellow Aubrey Hruby provided opening remarks and welcomed Hott to the Atlantic Council.

Hott outlined the state of Senegal’s economy and President Macky Sall’s focus on private sector-led growth. He emphasized the benefits of public-private partnerships over public borrowing and noted that his ministry and the Senegalese government as a whole is embracing this philosophy. With an increasing number of companies looking to diversify away from Chinese supply chains, Hott made the case that Senegal is a compelling substitute. The country is in favorable proximity to the US and European markets, has capable seaport and airfield facilities, and is already becoming a regional hub for logistics, services, and industry.

Following the minister’s remarks, Hruby moderated a discussion during which participants engaged Hott on areas of US competitive advantage and the role of small and medium-sized enterprises in increasing two-way trade.

In attendance and participating in the discussion were senior government officials from the US Agency for International Development, the US Department of Commerce, and the US Department of the Treasury, as well as numerous corporate executives.

The post Senegal’s economy minister outlines strategy for private sector-led growth appeared first on Atlantic Council.

Background and Election Conduct
Mauritania is a West African, Sahelian country that has been ruled by President Mohamed Ould Abdel Aziz since he took power in a 2008 coup d’état. Facing internal pressure from his ruling party, Aziz agreed to abide by term limits and step down, but his hand-picked replacement Mohamed Ould Ghazouani was widely viewed as a continuity candidate. Ghazouani’s main competitors in the election were Biram Dah Abeid, an anti-slavery activist, and Sidi Mohamed Ould Boubacar, who led a transitional government between 2005 and 2007 and was endorsed by Mauritania’s Islamist party Tawassoul.

Election day passed peacefully and relatively without incident. Observers praised the general conduct of the polls, but their presence was minimal, despite opposition requests. Only the African Union was allowed to monitor the election, and its team arrived only three days before the poll, missing all but one day of the campaign. The opposition, in an election day press conference, cited voting “irregularities” and instances of their party observers being barred from polling stations in several ruling party strongholds, but the court validated the election on July 1, leaving no room for further appeals.

In the aftermath of the election, tensions rose. Ghazouani preemptively declared himself the winner early Sunday, June 23, before the election commission’s announcement later that day. This prompted confrontations between protesters and police in the capital, and the country’s Internet was shut down between Sunday afternoon and Friday, June 28. On Monday, June 24, the offices of two opposition candidates were raided and closed, including that of runner-up Biram Dah Abeid. In statements on Tuesday, June 25, the government confirmed the arrest of one hundred protesters.

Amid these events, the election commission should be applauded for releasing results from the country’s 3,861 polling stations following opposition requests. This level of transparency has been absent from prior elections, and it is this dataset that forms the basis of this article’s subsequent analyses.

Assessing Claims of Fraud
The opposition has brought forth claims of overvoting. According to the published results, twelve polling stations had turnout of 100 percent or above, totaling 2,924 votes, of which 94 percent went to Ghazouani. Though the magnitude of these cases is small (less than 0.3 percent of votes cast), and thus would not affect the outcome alone, these results are clearly irregular and merit investigation. The election commission should be called on to explain these cases and to confirm that they are not symptomatic of a broader trend.

The opposition’s main argument appears to be just that: that overvoting in favor of Ghazouani was pervasive. The opposition casts doubt on the credibility of results from 455 polling stations in which it claims turnout was over 90 percent, suggesting that if these results were annulled, a second round would be required. However, according to the released data, only 68 polling stations had over 90 percent turnout, and it appears the 455 number refers to stations in which Ghazouani received more than 90 percent of the vote. This is an important distinction, as high vote counts for Ghazouani are not overly suspicious in their own right.

Instead, researchers have identified that ballot stuffing may be present in cases where “[u]nusually high vote counts tend to co-occur with unusually high turnout numbers.” This can be visualized by plotting Ghazouani’s cumulative vote share as a function of polling station turnout, seen below. The pronounced uptick for Ghazouani once polling station turnout surpassed 82 percent (circled on the far right) appears to be anomalous, as higher turnout seemed otherwise to relatively favor the opposition, and thus could suggest ballot stuffing at the margins. The election commission should investigate this possibility. However, the magnitude of this potential fraud would be well below what the opposition suggests, and it is unlikely that ballot stuffing in this subset of high turnout polling stations could have swung the result on its own.

Null Votes
Null votes in the presidential election were unremarkable, with totals of 2-4 percent spread across regions. It is worth noting, though, that the magnitude of null votes was significantly higher in past legislative, municipal, and even referenda polls. Null votes in the 2018 legislative election totaled 185,000 (18 percent of votes cast), with null votes in one administrative sub-region as high as 37 percent. While this discrepancy in the magnitude of null votes is stark, comparative analysis of past election data does not support foul play. Standardizing the level of null votes, the relative distributions are consistent across elections, suggesting that differences across regions may be related to more functional explanations.

Specifically, the difference in magnitude across elections is likely the result of more complex legislative and municipal ballots, and the uneven distribution across regions is at least partially explained by higher illiteracy rates in several southern regions of the country. This includes regions of high opposition support, where some Afro-Mauritanians feel disenfranchised. Thus, functional issues of ballot design and regional literacy matter and should be the subject of subsequent voter education and technical assistance programs. Lack thereof may have effectively disenfranchised up to 10 percent of registered voters in the 2018 legislative election, disproportionately affecting opposition areas.

Opposition Competitiveness
A reasonable question could be, why all this analysis for an election in which first and second place were separated by 34 percent? The answer is that a two-candidate second round could have been very competitive, and it was only avoided by 19,000 votes. Four of Ghazouani’s five competitors from the first round, making up almost 48 percent of the vote, closely cooperated to protest the results, and a joint election petition was submitted. These actions suggest that there would have been a united front behind Abeid in a second round.

It is also possible that the prospect of a competitive second round could have mobilized more voters. Higher turnout relatively favored the opposition, as discussed above, and while turnout in the presidential (63 percent) was lower than the 2018 legislative election (73 percent), valid votes went up in most opposition regions, compared to ruling party areas that failed to reach Aziz-era levels of turnout. Thus, between turnout trends and opposition unity, the ruling party would have faced a real test in a second round.  

Concluding Remarks
Overall, Mauritania’s election delivered some very positive precedents: respect for term limits, a democratic transfer of power, improved data transparency, and peaceful contestation. The United States and others are right to applaud such conduct. However, there are areas for improvement that should not be overlooked and several anomalies in the data that require further investigation. This article concludes with recommendations to the relevant stakeholders.

To the election commission:
The election commission should be congratulated for running a relatively smooth election and for releasing polling station level data. Further efforts should still be made to investigate and explain instances of overvoting, exceedingly high turnout, and null vote discrepancies. Emphasis must also be placed on voter education, especially in southern regions of the country where illiteracy is high. 

To the ruling party:
Foremost, President Aziz should be applauded for abiding by term limits. Improvements can be made in post-election conduct. The opposition and media must be provided space to review and contest the results, and restraint must be shown when releasing statements before results are official. The government should also make allowances for more international observers.

To the opposition:  
The opposition’s participation in the election was a positive development, after previous boycotts. Further, the opposition should be lauded for disputing the election through legal channels and supporting nonviolent methods of protest. When making allegations of fraud, the opposition should be careful not to overstate its accusations or include extraneous examples, as these actions could reduce the credibility of future claims.

To the international community:
Countries would be best served by waiting until all election cases and disputes are settled before congratulating the winner. Early congratulatory statements by the likes of France, Morocco, and Saudi Arabia threatened to undercut Mauritanian processes for legal contestation.

Luke Tyburski is a project assistant with the Africa Center.

The post Reviewing Mauritania’s historic election appeared first on Atlantic Council.

Mauritania is one of West Africa’s most resource-rich countries, and investment interest is on the rise. Development has started on its Greater Tortue Ahmeyim deep-water gas field, one of the region’s largest discoveries to date with an estimated fifteen trillion cubic feet of gas, and major mining companies continue to invest in the country’s substantial gold and iron ore deposits. Mauritania is also an important security partner in the Sahel, as a member of the US Trans-Sahara Counterterrorism Partnership and the G5 Sahel Joint Force. This article previews the country’s coming election, underscoring key trends and what to watch for.

Who are the major players?
Mohamed Ould Ghazouani is Aziz’s chosen successor and the UPR’s flagbearer. He is a military general, Aziz’s defense minister, and a longtime ally of the president. There are five other candidates, of whom three are significant. Sidi Mohamed Ould Boubacar, an independent candidate endorsed by Tawassoul, led the country’s transitional government between 2005 and 2007 and served as ambassador to the United Nations. Biram Dah Abeid is known for his activism against slavery, which remains a human rights issue in Mauritania. Finally, Mohamed Ould Maouloud is the leader of the opposition Union of the Forces of Progress (UFP) party. 

What can we expect in terms of turnout?
Historically, turnout for Mauritania’s presidential elections has been around 55-65 percent, with legislative elections pulling in 70-75 percent of registered voters. This discrepancy, which runs counter to global trends, may suggest that Mauritanians feel closer affinity to local politicians or believe that presidential races are less competitive. Low turnout may also be a symptom of fatigue with Aziz and the UPR. Turnout will thus be an indicator of political mobilization and perceptions of openness.

How successful will the ruling party be under its new flagbearer?
The UPR will likely win with a large plurality. For reference, Aziz won in the first round in both 2009 and 2014 with 53 and 82 percent respectively (the opposition boycotted in 2014). However, studies show that a party’s incumbency advantage declines in an open election, so one might expect Ghazouani to fair slightly worse than Aziz. The 50 percent mark, which would preclude a runoff, will therefore be a useful measuring stick in the coming polls. Ghazouani’s vote share will inform the UPR’s popular mandate moving forward.

Regional voting patterns are also something to watch for. UPR support varies across the country, per Figure 1, with higher opposition support in the major cities and in the south of the country, where many Afro-Mauritanians feel disenfranchised.

What is the implication of null votes?
The last legislative polls produced over 185,000 null votes, or about 18 percent of total votes cast. Mapped in Figure 2, high null vote shares correspond to areas of lower UPR support, seen in Figure 1. Comparing vote totals from 2018’s municipal and legislative elections, there is evidence that the null votes may serve as protest votes against the UPR. As such, the ruling party’s support is substantial but overstated. Parliamentary aggregation procedures also favor the UPR, which won almost 60 percent of the seats with just about 40 percent of the vote.

How will the Islamists fair?
Tawassoul currently heads the opposition, having received between eleven and thirteen percent of the vote across the different lists in 2018. Tawassoul’s leader has repeatedly branded the party as moderate, yet the government denounces Tawassoul as radical and extremist, holding a strong anti-Islamist line, which has gained the favor of Saudi Arabia. Government pressure helps explain Tawassoul’s caution, endorsing Boubacar instead of putting forth its own candidate. The party has performed best at the municipal level in the past and only offered up its own presidential candidate in 2009, receiving 4.76 percent of the vote. The level of national mobilization for Boubacar will advise Tawassoul’s ability to scale up in the future.

What can campaigning tell us?
The campaign period is between June 7 and June 20, and the candidates are on parallel tracks to visit each of the country’s thirteen regions. Of note, Aziz spoke at the opening of Ghazouani’s campaign, and Ghazouani’s schedule indicates that his penultimate stop will be an extended visit to Aziz’s hometown. Clearly, the UPR is still counting on Aziz’s pull. While Ghazouani has had each region to himself on the campaign, Boubacar and Abeid overlapped on five of their first six days. In terms of rallying supporters, this clearly favors Ghazouani and speaks to the fragmented state of the opposition.  

Can we expect a credible election?
Opposition warnings of an electoral “hold-up” perpetrated by the government likely foreshadow claims of fraud. No international observers have been permitted, and opposition candidate Biram Dah Abeid was imprisoned for five months in 2018. The opposition has garnered some concessions, though, and its mere participation is a positive signal after several boycotts. Notably, opposition appointees were added to the election commission in May, and the government agreed that the military would no longer vote on a separate day, increasing transparency. It will likely be difficult to find independent assessments of the election, meaning that opposition claims will have to be weighed against those of journalists, civil society, and any data released by the election commission.

Will there be protests or violence?
Prior elections have avoided violence, though protests against the abolition of the senate in 2017 were “actively dispersed.” If tension were to arise, cities and the southern regions would be the expected flashpoints.

Final Takeaways
Though the outcome may seem preset, the June 22 election will provide valuable insight into the state of Mauritanian politics. The UPR will be looking to maintain its authoritarian status quo despite a change in leadership, similar to the unfolding transitions in the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Sudan, and Zimbabwe. While the election is thus more a referendum on the UPR than a true opportunity for a pluralistic opening, the opposition’s vote share does matter. A stronger opposition showing would signal an erosion of UPR authority and could limit the range of options for the ruling party moving forward, with one such option rumored to be an Aziz comeback in 2024. Above all, the election will set the tone for the next five years, which will be critical in determining the extent of authoritarian entrenchment in Mauritania.

Luke Tyburski is a project assistant with the Africa Center.

The post Mauritania election primer appeared first on Atlantic Council.

Maïga presented his country’s efforts to improve security at both the national and regional levels. He praised the ongoing presence of the United Nations Multidimensional Integrated Stabilization Mission in Mali (MINUSMA), and advocated for its renewal by the UN Security Council. However, he warned that armed groups do not respect borders and operate in a pan-Sahelian theater. To properly respond to these threats, he asserted that MINUSMA’s mandate should be expanded to provide a regional security architecture.

The prime minister also addressed the state of the Group of Five for the Sahel (G5 Sahel) Joint Force, arguing that the organization should expand to include more partners from West Africa in order to fill structural gaps as well as to give countries whose own security is also impacted by jihadist and other terrorist groups operating in the Sahel region a role in confronting the challenge. Without the inclusion of countries such as Côte d’Ivoire, Senegal, and Togo, Maïga warned that threats successfully countered by the G5 Sahel Joint Force would regroup and find refuge at the borders with non-member states. In addition, he called for the standardization of training and equipment among G5 member states’ militaries to improve interoperability and ensure similar capabilities among the Joint Force’s units.

Maïga hailed the solid cooperation between the United States and Mali in military and security matters and expressed the hope that, in time, it would expand to include partnerships in economic and other sectors.

Within Mali, Maïga outlined his government’s efforts to implement security sector reform. He noted that the Malian government had initiated an inclusive process that has engaged both local and international experts, as well as a cross section of Malian civil society, religious organizations, and opposition parties. While the security situation has improved in Mali’s northern region, Maïga acknowledged that the implementation of the 2015 Algiers Accords has been complicated by the migration of jihadist groups and criminal networks to the central Mopti region.

Despite these challenges, Camara outlined the progress that Mali has made in addressing security threats since a military coup in 2012. Citing Mali’s longstanding partnership with the United States, Camara reiterated how critical continued US engagement through initiatives such as the Trans-Sahel Counterterrorism Partnership is to the success of Mali’s fight against armed jihadist groups.

A discussion, moderated by Dr. J. Peter Pham, vice president for research and regional initiatives and director of the Africa Center at the Atlantic Council, followed the delegation’s remarks. Participants focused on mitigating abuses by Malian security forces, the application of justice in cases of abuse, and ways to improve interoperability between MINUSMA and the G5 Sahel Joint Force.

The prime minister and foreign minister were accompanied by a delegation that included H.E. Mahamadou Nimaga, ambassador to the United States; and The Hon. Karim Keïta, chairman of the National Commission of Defense, Security, and Civil Protection of the National Assembly; of the Republic of Mali.

Those in attendance and participating in the discussion included Ms. Whitney Y. Baird, deputy assistant secretary for West Africa and security affairs; Mr. Franklin D. Kramer, Atlantic Council senior fellow and former assistant secretary of defense for international security affairs; Ms. Amanda Dory, former deputy assistant secretary of defense for Africa; LTG (ret.) William E. Ward, former commander of US Africa Command; and MG (ret.) D. Christopher Leins, Atlantic Council senior fellow and former deputy director for politico-military affairs in charge of Africa on the Joint Staff.

A reception for the visiting delegation and other participants followed the roundtable, during which Prime Minister Maïga, acting on behalf of H.E. Ibrahim Boubacar Keïta, president of the Republic of Mali, presented Dr. Pham with the insignia of Commander of the National Order of Mali, the highest of the country’s honorific orders, for his commitment to Mali over the years, especially during the arduous process of restoring and strengthening constitutional government. The award was approved by President Keïta last year, but, due to the scheduling demands of his US government service, Dr. Pham had not been able to travel to the West African country for his investiture.

The post Mali’s prime minister and foreign minister discuss security sector appeared first on Atlantic Council.

Observers note that in many respects, the Trump Administration’s security strategy for Africa looks similar to that of the Obama Administration: kinetic strikes combined with support to African militaries fighting insurgencies on the ground. But there is a marked difference in emphasis. While President Trump threatens to slash aid, Obama’s security strategy relied heavily on building partner military capacity and on providing broader packages of development aid and humanitarian relief as a means of boosting economic growth and countering radicalization. Until recently, defense chief James Mattis seemed to share that emphasis: amid persistent reports of plans to downscale military assistance to African partners, he steadily managed to increase it and to reassure allies of US commitment to multilateral efforts. But with his – and UN Ambassador Nikki Haley’s – departure, John Bolton has clearly taken possession of the field, making any insights that can be gleaned from his speech particularly important.

Bolton reaffirmed President Trump’s intention to cut foreign aid, vowing, in particular, that the United States would “no longer support unproductive, unsuccessful, and unaccountable” United Nations peacekeeping missions. He pointed out that the presence of UN Blue Helmets in Western Sahara since 1991 had “frozen” rather than resolved those conflicts – he might have added Congo or South Sudan. But perhaps more importantly, he carefully singled out an alternate model for praise: the counterterrorism alliance between Mauritania, Mali, Burkina Faso, Niger, and Chad that is known as the G5 Sahel. Significantly, he described the G5 Sahel as “a great example of the enormous potential for African joint security cooperation,” and remarked that he wished “to see more cooperative regional security organizations like these emerge around the world.”

The G5 Sahel was created by France in 2014 to help Sahelian countries to coordinate their efforts to combat the growing threat from Al Qaeda and indigenous terror groups in West Africa. The G5 countries coordinate on security and development matters, but the alliance’s main feature is the G5 Sahel Joint Force, which consists of troops from each of the nations working jointly on border control and counterterrorism.

The joint force is an “African-led, French-assisted, US-supported force,” in the words of Africom Commander, General Thomas Waldhauser. The joint force is still in the capacity-building stage but is intended to grow to 5,000 troops, and it has already conducted six operations. After enduring a severe attack on its headquarters and reshuffling its leadership last summer, it has announced that more are to come.

But the security situation in the Sahel remains dire, and it is unlikely that the coalition of Mauritania, Mali, Burkina Faso, Niger, and Chad can soon become wide enough in its scope of action and self-reliant enough in its funding. This is a big problem, because political support for the UN and French missions that currently support the G5 Sahel is diminishing. The French Operation Barkhane has been striking jihadist leaders since 2014; and though French President Emmanuel Macron reaffirmed his support for the mission as recently as last month, Operation Barkhane is increasingly hamstrung by interethnic tensions, in Mali in particular. Meanwhile, the UN mission in Mali is among the most dangerous peacekeeping operations in the world, and the UN Security Council intends to significantly “adapt” the mission – a diplomatic word for downsizing – in the absence of any progress in the implementation of the peace agreement signed in 2015 between the Malian government and armed groups.

All of this puts added pressure on the G5 Sahel to contain the Mali crisis and prevent it from spreading outwards through the region. However, in 2017, the United States blocked a Security Council resolution that would have given the G5 Sahel joint force a peacekeeping mandate under the UN Charter’s Chapter VII, authorizing the G5 Sahel to use force across borders, and – most vitally – granting it a predictable source of funding from the UN peacekeeping operations budget. In doing so, Washington claimed that a peacekeeping mandate was unneeded by the G5 Sahel, whose forces predominantly operate within their own national borders. In reality, though, the Trump Administration seemed opposed to providing the G5 Sahel with funding from the UN peacekeeping operations budget. The Chapter VII mandate would in effect have shifted much of the financial burden of supporting the G5 Sahel away from France and the European Union and onto the United States (which is automatically allocated 28 percent of the UN peacekeeping budget).

This was perhaps a reasonable objection and it is certainly consistent with the Trump Administration’s stated policy platform. But it has left the G5 Sahel without access to a recurring financing mechanism. And that could greatly undermine its capacity to fight terrorism and prevent the spread of transnational crime.

So far, G5 countries have managed to score impressive bilateral contributions, including from the United States. At a February 2018 donor’s conference in Brussels, more than fifty countries and international organizations collectively pledged half a billion dollars to support the joint force. The European Union and Saudi Arabia pledged over $120 million each, and the United States promised $60 million – then doubled the amount in November 2018.

But major donor conferences cannot be organized every month. More important, while Chapter VII funds are disbursed on a regular schedule, the promised bilateral contributions are materializing very slowly. Jean-Pierre Lacroix, the UN undersecretary for peacekeeping operations, said last November that “almost 50 percent of pledges generated have not been earmarked, let alone disbursed.” The lack of financing predictability is detrimental to the joint force’s buildup and worrying for its future operations.

During his speech last December, Bolton seemed to double down on the Trump Administration’s objection to a Chapter VII mandate, stating that “G5 countries must remain in the driver’s seat – this initiative cannot be outsourced to the UN for funding and other support.”

Bolton’s hope seems to be that the burden of fundraising will encourage the G5 Sahel to stay performance-driven and accountable towards its donors, and motivated to “resolve conflicts, not freeze them in perpetuity” – unlike many UN peacekeeping missions. And he does have a point: peacekeeping operations in Africa do often tend to be self-perpetuating, and sometimes feed the conflicts they are intended to end. As the donor, the United States – which seems willing to pay its fair share of the G5 Sahel’s bill – should in principle be entitled to choose whether to contribute those funds on a bilateral or multilateral basis.

But, principle aside, denying the G5 Sahel a peacekeeping mandate is a risky bet. Without predictable and sustainable funding, the operational capacity of the G5 Sahel Joint Force will almost certainly suffer. Instead of “taking the driver’s seat,” the G5 countries may decide that the alliance is more trouble than it’s worth. Political will to coordinate security and development efforts across borders is already weak: Mauritania and Chad are, after all, no more eager to pay for Mali’s security than are the United States and France – without the incentive of regular donor funding, they may well withdraw. If the G5 Sahel flounders, not only will the situation in Mali deteriorate – requiring the UN peacekeepers who are already there to do more, at US taxpayers’ expense – but the jihadist threat from West Africa will grow, perhaps until it poses a security threat that the United States cannot ignore. If that happens, Washington may regret that it failed to create a Sahelian-led peacekeeping mission when it had the chance.

Matthieu Fernandez was a project assistant with the Africa Center.

The post Bolton’s risky bet in the Sahel appeared first on Atlantic Council.

Recognizing the transborder nature of the security, socioeconomic, and environmental challenges facing them – ranging from terrorism to criminal trafficking to a major unemployment crisis – Mauritania, Mali, Burkina Faso, Niger, and Chad banded together in 2014 to form the Group of Five for the Sahel (G5 Sahel). While Western donor nations celebrated this initiative as a proof of the nations’ mutual commitment to improving the security situation in the region, in reality, the G5 Sahel remains heavily reliant on France and other international donors for funding and operational and logistic capacity, and exercises little decision-making power.

In 2017, in a bid to expand the G5 Sahel’s autonomy and add operational capacity, member states and their partners launched two new initiatives: the joint force for the G5 Sahel (FC-G5S), which is aimed at countering terrorism and improving border control, and the Sahel Alliance, which is designed to coordinate development projects across the region. While these efforts have given the G5 Sahel new tools for addressing regional challenges, a dearth of unity among member states continues to hinder its success. To achieve a more robust union, member states must devote more political will and domestic resources to solving regional challenges, reducing the imbalances among their militaries and their commitments to regional security, and better coordinating the G5 Sahel’s security and development initiatives.

Different Political Situations

The member states of the G5 Sahel struggle with underdevelopment, political insecurity, and limited technical capacity of the local institutions. These challenges have different variations in each country, but they virtually always capture most of the political will and resources of each government, leaving little of both for advancing a regional initiative such as the G5 Sahel.

In Mali, the government is still fully occupied with denying a safe haven for the terrorist groups that have multiplied and formed new alliances since 2012. (Most of the Al-Qaeda affiliates regrouped in 2017 to form the Group to Support Islam and Muslims, while other terrorist organizations that had split with Al-Qaeda as early as 2015 have pledged allegiance to the Islamic State to form the Islamic State in the Greater Sahara.) The Malian government must also deal with the unresolved social, ethnic, and religious tensions that have always plagued the country and fueled the 2012 rebellion. President Ibrahim Boubacar Keïta has governed the southern half of the country with a steady hand since 2013 but has made little progress on pacifying the country’s north. The peace agreement signed in 2015 in Algiers by Mali’s government with rebel groups from the north, the Coordination of Azawad Movements, and pro-government armed groups, the Platform, has yet to be fully implemented.

The other four nations are also preoccupied by internal challenges: Niger, Burkina Faso, and Mauritania have experienced significant regime changes over the last decade, and the Chadian president is preoccupied by Chad’s restive opposition and its periodic challenges to his rule.

The fact that the region’s security problems are concentrated in Mali, Burkina Faso, and Niger is another complicating factor. Since the founding of the G5 Sahel, donor focus has been firmly set on the “triborder” region between those countries. Requests to divert resources from Mauritania or Chad, which have already contributed troops and national resources to the United Nations Mission Multidimensional Integrated Stabilization Mission in Mali (MINUSMA) and the Multinational Joint Task Force against Boko Haram (MNJTF), for the purpose of restoring security in neighboring countries, have met with resistance. However, this appears to be changing, especially since the nomination over the summer of a Mauritanian and a Chadian to become respectively commander and deputy commander of the FC-G5S’s joint staff.

Unbalanced Military Capabilities

The Sahelian militaries command painfully few resources. The combined military expenditure of the G5 Sahel member states amounts to only about $1.2 billion (0.07% of global spending). However, there is great variance in their overall military capacities.

Chad is considered the regional power; its armed forces are relatively advanced, and it has a proven track-record as a peacekeeping troop contributor. The Malian military, by contrast, is catastrophically disorganized and overwhelmed by internal security threats. Although training and equipping the Malian military has been a priority of international partners (including the United States, France, and the European Union) since 2013, it has yet to catch up with its neighbors. Further reforming and improving the country’s military and institutions will allow it to counter terrorist groups, ease tensions between communities, regain control of lost territory and cooperate more effectively with other member states.

These military imbalances are heightened by cultural factors. Given many of these countries have experienced military coups, countries like Burkina Faso and Niger seem reluctant to grow their militaries too quickly. The mismatch between countries in the direst security situations and the ones holding the most military capabilities effectively requires Chad and Mauritania to police their neighbors and spend their scarce resources providing security to other countries, while others must endeavor to catch up including to avoid creating resentment.

Balancing Socioeconomic and Security Challenges

The Sahel Alliance and the FC-G5S show the two dimensions in which the G5 Sahel is meant to act: economic development and regional security. The goal is to balance and coordinate security and development activities to achieve progress across the Sahel. To do so, cooperation between member states is necessary, because a security operation in one country may have effects for a development project in the next, and vice versa. (For instance, when in 2015, Niger adopted strong anti-trafficking legislation to disrupt smuggling networks in the region of Agadez, the informal economy surrounding the smuggling trade was also disrupted, causing painful economic fallout in a region where grievances are already many, inadvertently fueling radicalization and terror recruitment.) The likelihood of unintended consequences from an FC-G5S operation or a Sahel Alliance project makes coordination between the Sahelian states essential.

With commitments amounting to $509 million made by donor countries to the FC-G5S at a summit held in Brussels earlier this year (including $123 million committed by both the European Union and by Saudi Arabia, $37 million by the United Arab Emirates, and $60 million by the United States, which has since doubled), the FC-G5S is under pressure to demonstrate that taxpayer funding is being put to good use. The same goes for the more than five hundred projects, worth around $7.5 billion, that the Sahel Alliance has promised to implement between 2018 and 2022, ranging from youth employment initiatives to energy and climate projects. Expectations are high.

The formation of the G5 Sahel, and later the Sahel Alliance and the FC-G5S, indicates that there is a willingness on the part of regional governments to work together on the many pressing security and economic development challenges facing the region. However, the inability of the member states to contribute equally to solving these challenges is a constant source of tension and threatens the sense of solidarity and unified purpose that is needed for the G5 Sahel countries to work efficiently as a collective.

Matthieu Fernandez was an intern with the Africa Center.

The post Looking for unity in the Sahel appeared first on Atlantic Council.

This past summer, one could not help but wonder as the leaders of Europe and Africa, in separate meetings, seemed to talk past one another as they sought to deal with what has become one of the most significant—if not the single most important—challenge in the relations between those countries north of the Mediterranean Sea and those located along the southern shore of the old Mare Nostrum and their neighbors farther down on the continent.

After marathon negotiations over June 28 and 29, the European Union’s heads of state and government called for the establishment of migrant processing centers in North Africa and agreed to “swiftly explore the concept of regional platforms in close cooperation” with non-EU countries and various international organizations. They also agreed to set up secure processing centers for migrants who manage to land in Europe, although, tellingly, none of them volunteered to host one of these installations. They further reaffirmed their commitment to strengthening external border controls and held out the prospect of more funding for Turkey and countries in the Maghreb, from which the migrants embark.

At the same time the EU leaders were meeting in Brussels, the African Union’s 31^st ordinary summit of heads of state and government convened in Nouakchott from June 25 to July 2. Migration was likewise discussed in the Mauritanian capital, both at the top leadership level and in a special meeting of the AU Peace and Security Council. A number of speakers, including AU Commission Chair Moussa Faki Mahamat came out in opposition to the regional disembarkation platforms for migrants rescued in international waters that the EU wanted to locate on the African continent. Instead, accepting a proposal tabled earlier this year by Morocco (whose sovereign, King Mohammed VI, had previously been designated by the AU as the regional body’s point person on migration issues), the African leaders decided to create an African Observatory for Migration and Development (OAMD) to be based in Rabat.

About the only common ground was possibly the acknowledgment by French President Emmanuel Macron, who went on from the EU meeting to visit Nigeria and Mauritania, arriving in the latter country in time to catch the end of the AU meeting, that migration is “one of the greatest political challenges of today and the next few years because it will not stop.” Macron went on to say, “Let’s look lucidly at this subject of migration. The very poor do not leave their country, they are the middle classes of emerging economies that are passing through Libya today… An overwhelming majority of those who go to sea after months, years of wandering, suffering, where do they come from? Nigeria, Senegal, Côte d’Ivoire, Guinea. Are these countries doing less well than they were ten years ago? No. And so we have a youth who believe that there is no hope in their countries.”

Even if one begs to differ with the French head of state on some points of his analysis, there is no doubt about either the need to deal with the challenge posed by the phenomenon or that the only way to do so is to first have a better grasp of its dynamics.

Limiting ourselves for the purposes of this article to economic migrants—people who leave their home countries in search of employment or better socio-economic circumstances, rather than the larger and more complex populations of refugees, asylum seekers, and persons displaced by conflict or natural disasters—one finds that while the attention at the two recent summits has focused on the crisis being played out on the Mediterranean, that area is only one of three major pathways of migration on the continent, even if it is the most iconic given the new Italian Interior Minister Mario Salvini’s refusal in late June to allow the Gibraltar-flagged rescue boat Aquarius, operated by a German aid group and carrying at the time some 630 migrants, to dock at Italian ports. (Subsequently, Salvini, who is also concurrently the country’s Deputy Prime Minister, also turned away an Italian commercial vessel that had pulled migrants to safety while servicing oil platforms off the Libyan coast.)

In addition to the Mediterranean route, migrants also cross the Gulf of Aden to the Arabian Peninsula. Despite the war that continues to ravage Yemen, an estimated 40,000 Africans traveled that route last year. Moreover, several tens of thousands of economic migrants also head not to Europe, but to Southern Africa, mostly along the continent’s eastern littoral from the Horn of Africa region. Thus it is important to understand that, even as the global media have trained its cameras on the passage across the Mediterranean and populist politicians in Europe seek advantage by invoking the specter of unchecked masses sailing across the sea, the poverty, corruption, and poor governance driving many of Africans to leave their homes—as well as the prospect of better socio-economic conditions that attracts them—means that the movement of humanity won’t stop even if one major corridor can somehow be blocked.

Whatever pathway they choose, many experts estimate that more than three-quarters of African migrants avail themselves of smugglers, a statistic that underscores both the potential risk to the migrants as well as a disconcerting political economy that empowers criminal networks and threatens regional security. A 2017 study by Mark Micallef and funded by the Norwegian Foreign Ministry, found that while the focus has been on coastal regions like that of Libya, the illicit trade has networks that are embedded not only across the country, but, indeed, across the continent. Operators along the Libyan coast, for example, were found to have well-established connections with agents as far afield as East Africa (especially Eritrea, Ethiopia, Kenya, Somalia, and Sudan) and the Levant, in addition to better known links to West Africa. According to the Maltese researcher, “The expansion and consolidation of smuggling activity has been further predicated on the interface with communities, as it has been justified as a means to fund militias, which in turn provide security in the face of external threats from competing families, tribes, and towns. Migrants and refugees have become simply another commodity to be exploited in the broader resource predation carried out by armed groups that exercise effective control over the Libyan territory.  The consequences for human security, both for the migrants and for the Libyan people, are considerable.”

A different study by the Africa Center for Strategic Studies at the National Defense University in December 2017 estimated, conservatively, that African migrant smuggling was an economy worth around $1 billion to the criminal networks, militias, corrupt officials, and extremist militants involved.

However, what makes eradicating the problem difficult is that, while action is needed now—both for urgent humanitarian and self-evident political reasons—a long-term perspective is needed. Any short-term actions, whether undertaken by international actors or national authorities risks unwittingly playing into the hands of the very disruptive criminal and insurgent groups that are known to have profited from the human trafficking.

There is an interesting field study conducted at the end of last year by Dutch researchers in Agadez, a Saharan town in the center of Niger that, in the wake of the collapse of the Muammar Gaddafi regime in Libya (and the continuing failure to stand up any effective national government in its place), became a major hub for the smugglers facilitating the movement of sub-Saharan African migrants to Europe. The EU established a strategic partnership with the government of Niger to stem the flow of migrants heading north, providing support funding and various capacity-building programs to the Sahelian country to implement its 2015 law against the smuggling of migrants, the first African country to enact in its national legal system the provisions of the Protocol against the Smuggling of Migrants by Land, Sea and Air, supplementing the 2000 United Nations Convention against Transnational Organized Crime.

The barren Aïr region around Agadez was once the heart of a Berber sultanate ruled by the Tuareg until French colonial authorities conquered them in 1900. Since then, it has been a restive area whose residents’ sense of political marginalization broke out in armed rebellion as recently as 2007-2009, a conflict which, ironically, exacerbated the decline of the area by effectively shutting down the tourism that was a major part of the local economy either directly by providing services to visitors or secondarily, such as by artisanal manufacturers of jewelry and other handicrafts. Subsequently, the growth of the migration proved a boon for residents who previously benefited from the once-thriving tourism industry: former tour guides with knowledge of the desert found work as passeurs–drivers transported African migrants instead of well-heeled European tourists, caterers shifted their menu offerings to meet the needs of their new customers, etc. “All-inclusive” packages were even offered that included pick-up, local accommodations, transport, and provisions.

The robust implementation since the end of 2016 of the new Nigerien anti-trafficking law—including the arrest of both operators and corrupt officials as well as the creation of check points and the confiscation of hundreds of vehicles used to transport migrants from the region onward to Libya—has significantly curtailed northbound migration from Agadez, although whether the route has simply shifted is a different matter altogether. In fact, there is at least anecdotal evidence that the statistical success is not without cost as migrants have been abandoned in the desert as those smuggling them sought to evade arrest. In any event, the Dutch researchers found that approximately 6,000 locals (out of Agadez’s population of approximately 125,000 people) were directly employed in the migration “business” and about half of the town’s households derived at least part of their incomes from either the migrant flow or the concomitant trade with Libya. The crackdown, combined with the shutdown of the tourism trade and the decline of once-thriving gold mines, has left the region in economic crisis with social tensions on the uptick. It goes without saying the criminal and extremist groups operating across the Sahel are more than ready to exploit any additional grievances that crop up.

The reality was certainly not lost on the participants in the AU summit that this last possibility is anything but trivial. In fact, on the margins of the Nouakchott meeting, a UN Support Plan for the Sahel was launched by Deputy Secretary-General Amina J. Mohamed, herself the daughter of a herdsman-veterinarian from Gombe State in northeastern Nigeria, an area that was seeing attacks on outposts by Boko Haram fighters as recently as February of this year and where even as late as June there were still roads connecting major population centers along which civilians did not venture without military escorts. As the permanent secretary of the G5 Sahel regional group, Maman Samba Sidikou, observed in an interview ahead of the AU summit, “The terrorists thrive on their ability to communicate and spread their ideas within communities. It is imperative that there be paradigm shift for the Sahel that includes an economic and social development component… [and] the realization of cross-border development projects.”

It is inescapable that the very same scenario of unintended consequences as occurred in Agadez will undoubtedly play itself out, with local variations, across Africa if European politicians and their African counterparts somehow manage to achieve any success in staunching the flow of migrants. That is why a multi-pronged strategy is the only one that can hope to be sustainable over the long term. Such an approach will not only have to address the concerns about border security that animate many Europeans as well as the drivers of migration that are the issue for Africans, but it must also contend with the very nuanced political economies that have emerged because of the phenomenon.

In his “African Agenda on Migration,” presented by the Moroccan monarch to his fellow African leaders back in January as part of his mandate as the AU’s leader on migration issues and which proposed the creation of the OAMD that the AU summit ultimately endorsed, Mohammed VI urged a comprehensive rethink of migration, not only as a crisis which has seen millions of men, women, and children risk their lives in recent years, to reach Europe, but also as an intra-African concern, since four out of five migrants remain on the African continent itself.  According to the monarch, dealing holistically with the challenges which have arisen “presupposes a paradigm shift” as well as “an approach based on national policies, sub-regional coordination, a continental vision and international partnership.” The global community is still a long way from achieving those lofty objectives, but if that is ever to come to pass, it must first begin with a greater understanding of what is happening and a better anticipation of its effects.

J. Peter Pham is vice president of the Atlantic Council and director of its Africa Center.

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It may be day or two before results are announced, but IBK, who received 41.42 percent of the votes cast in the first round, is expected to trounce his challenger, who garnered only 17.8 percent. Having failed to unite the other twenty-two opposition candidates behind his bid to unseat the incumbent after the Constitutional Court last week rejected challenges to first-round results and confirmed the runoff, Cissé—whose two previous campaigns for the presidency both ended in defeat—had an uphill fight: businessman Aliou Diallo and former Prime Minister Cheick Modibo Diarra, who finished third and fourth respectively in the July 29 poll with 7.95 and 7.46 percent of the vote, both decided to remain neutral in the runoff, while several of the other defeated candidates—including Housseini Amion Guindo and Modibo Koné, who came in fifth and seventh, respectively, as well as the only female candidate in the race, Kanté Djénèba N’Diaye—urged their supporters to support IBK.

And while their candidates abstained from taking sides in the runoff, Cheick Keïta (no relation to IBK), head of the youth wing of Aliou Diallo’s Alliance Démocratique pour la Paix-Maliba, and his counterpart in former Prime Minister Modibo Sidibé’s Forces Alternatives pour le Renouveau et l’Emergence, Amadou Cissé, both called upon their members to vote for the incumbent, as did Arouna Traoré, youth leader of Modibo Koné’s Mouvement Mali Kanu. These endorsements are especially significant given that more than 60 percent of Malians are under the age of 25 and for many of them this is the first presidential election.

While some commentators have made much of the fact that IBK is the first incumbent Malian leader to have to face a runoff since the 1991 March Revolution forced out longtime military strongman Moussa Traoré and ushered in two decades of multiparty democracy, another way to look at it is that, unlike many other places on the African continent, the constitutional institutions have sufficiently matured and the politics are open enough that a sitting head of state can be challenged.

The real threat of violence—three members of a terrorist unit allegedly planning attacks in the capital city of Bamako were arrested one day before the vote—cast a shadow over the runoff, although the number of polling stations that failed to open because of security reasons was significantly lower than during the first round; most of the shuttered stations were in the Timbuktu region, where jihadists killed the head of the election bureau in Arkodia, 100 kilometers southwest of the fabled city on the edge of the Sahara. Moreover, the foregone conclusion of the results of the second round given the lack of enthusiasm for the challenger, even among the political opposition, also seems to have depressed overall turnout even more than has historically been the case in Mali, where on average less than one-third of the voters have cast ballots in the second round of presidential elections. Nevertheless, observers like the Congolese-born former Italian Minister of Integration, Dr. Cécile Kyenge, who led the European Union’s election monitoring team, noted that “all stations were staffed, the electoral material was sufficient, and ballot boxes were correctly sealed.”

With most analysts in agreement on the likely result of Sunday’s poll, there are still two outstanding questions to be answered.

First, what will the winner do with his new mandate? There is certainly no shortage of challenges. As the attempts by militants to disrupt the democratic process underscored, the security situation in Mali, especially the sparsely-populated northern expanses of the country, remains precarious. For four years in a row now, the 15,000-strong United Nations Multidimensional Integrated Stabilization Mission in Mali (MINUSMA) enjoys the rather dubious distinction of being the deadliest peacekeeping operation in the world. And the situation may be worsening as competition among extremist groups as well as intercommunal violence has led one civil society group to tally 932 attacks in just the first six months of this year. The insecurity in Mali has also spilled over the country’s borders into neighboring Niger and Burkina Faso, adding a regional dimension that the G5 Sahel force, based in Sévaré in central Mali, is trying to contend with.

Jumpstarting the stalled implementation of the agreement for peace and reconciliation that the government reached with the ethnic separatists in 2015 as part of the “Algiers process” should be a priority in the new presidential term; a solid effort would go a long way to dampen the fires of conflict in the north, especially among Kel Tamasheq (Tuareg) tribesmen who have rebelled four times since Mali’s independence in 1960. More also needs to be done to foster dialogue between different communities, especially in the central part of the country that has witnessed much of the recent uptick in violence, as well as to improve governance on the subnational levels of Mali’s regions and their constituent districts (“cercles”). IBK should have greater room for maneuver here since the constitution’s limit of two presidential terms frees him to a certain extent from more pedestrian politicking.

If the overall security situation can be improved, the government can focus more on its economic agenda. While Bamako is the fastest growing city in Africa (and the sixth-fastest in the world) and Mali booming economy that saw real GDP jump 5.5 percent last year in large part because of the country’s emergence as the third-largest gold miner in Africa and the continent’s top producer of cotton—rather extraordinary considering just six years ago the country was a failed state that had suffered a coup with two-thirds of its territory overrun by tribal separatists allied with jihadists. However, a rapidly increasing population means that these otherwise positive indicators are not enough. Mali still ranks 175^th out of 188 countries and territories on the UN Human Development Index for 2017 and unemployment, especially among young people, represents a severe problem. Investment is needed, not only to create jobs, but also to diversify the economy which, alas, is too exposed to fluctuations in commodity prices.

Second, while the international community’s stake in Mali’s success is pretty evident—in addition to the blue-helmeted MINUSMA force (one which Canadian armed forces officially launched their participation in just two weeks ago), the counterterrorism Operation Barkhane is France’s largest overseas military deployment, with 4,500 personnel spread across Mali and its neighbors in the Sahel, to cite just one datum—how forthcoming will global partners be in delivering the resources needed, whether on a multilateral or a bilateral basis, to sustainably secure the progress achieved over past few years in Mali? One can only hope that they are, because the security of the Sahel and beyond depends on the strategic West African country’s continued stabilization and improving prospects for the future.

J. Peter Pham is vice president of the Atlantic Council and director of its Africa Center.

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Although a first-time visitor to Bamako, the sprawling Malian capital on the banks of the Niger River, might not know it from the rapid urbanization of the fastest growing city in Africa (and the sixth-fastest in the world) and the booming economy that saw real GDP jump 5.5 percent last year, just six years ago this was a failed state. After two decades of enviable constitutional order that caused then-Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton to hail the country as “a model of stability and democracy in sub-Saharan Africa,” Mali collapsed under the combined pressure of tribal separatists allied with Islamist extremists, both reinforced with weapons and fighters that flowed freely from the wreckage of Muammar Gaddafi’s Libya. Angered that they were left so poorly equipped to fight the rebels, the elements of the military overthrew President Amadou Toumani Touré just weeks before he was scheduled to step down at the end of his second and final term of office. Amid the ensuing chaos, the separatists and their Islamist allies seized control of the northern two-thirds of the country. It took a French-led military intervention in early 2013 to prevent the militants from overrunning the rest of the country and, ultimately, to drive them from the provincial capitals they had occupied.

In the wake of Operation Serval, elections were quickly organized which, while the results clearly reflected the will of the Malian people—a majority of registered voters took part and, in the second round, almost 78 percent cast their ballots for Ibrahim Boubacar Keïta, a former prime minister commonly known by his initials “IBK”—it was also evident that even if the polls might have been “good enough” under the circumstances, there was plenty of room for improvement.And the ensuing years have not been easy. While President Keïta’s government reached an “agreement for peace and reconciliation” with the ethnic separatists in 2015, its implementation has been hobbled, in part because of the ongoing insurgency by the Islamist extremists whom the separatists brought into their fight earlier in the decade. These jihadists who, as I pointed out in congressional testimony last year, align themselves varyingly with either al-Qaeda or the so-called Islamic State, have given rise to ever-increasing violence as they “literally compete to outdo each other in the Sahel in the hopes of attracting recruits and other resources.” Thus despite the dubious distinction that the 15,000-strong United Nations Multidimensional Integrated Stabilization Mission in Mali (MINUSMA) enjoys for being the deadliest peacekeeping operation in the world for four straight years, the UN Security Council unanimously adopted Resolution 2423 late last month, extending mission’s mandate for another year during which it will be joined by some 250 Canadian troops who recently began arriving in the country. Moreover, the deadly October 4, 2017, ambush of US Special Operations Forces by Islamic State in Greater Sahara militants in Niger, not far from the porous border with northern Mali, only underscored the seriousness of the threat emanating from this part of the Sahel.

The impact of the insecurity goes well beyond counterterrorism concerns, as worrisome as these are in and of themselves. The violence, coupled with poverty and governance challenges, also contribute to the flow of Malian migrants trying to reach Europe: a study last year by the Africa Center for Strategic Studies at the National Defense University found Mali ranked sixth among African countries in absolute terms of migrants crossing the Mediterranean and second in terms of migrants per capita making the voyage. Even more than a source of illegal migration to Europe, Gao in northeastern Mali is a major transit hub with smugglers and other human traffickers exploiting the government’s struggles to funnel more than 40,000 people annually to embarkation points in Algeria and Libya, according to 2017 research by the Netherlands Institute of International Relations Clingendael. With the more immediate threats they face from jihadists as well as separatists, it is understandable why, however sympathetic they may be, helping Europe with its migration crisis may not be the highest priority for Malian officials, especially given the lack of resources to invest in the effort.

Within Mali, despite not-insignificant progress since the 2012 coup, the security situation remains precarious, especially in the northern and central regions where just last week militants fired mortars on the airport in Sevaré, which is both the base of a MINUSMA contingent and the headquarters of the G5 Sahel counterterrorism force made up of soldiers from Burkina Faso, Chad, Mauritania, and Niger, as well as Mali, and shelled a town in the Kidal region during the voting on Sunday, an attack that Jama’at Nusrat al-Islam wal-Muslimeen, an umbrella group linked with al-Qaeda, claimed credit for. Not surprisingly, this insecurity has fueled tensions between various groups and intercommunal violence is on the uptick, with the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights reporting close to 300 civilians killed so far this year, three-quarters of them in the central Mopti region. To their credit, Malian authorities have acknowledged that some soldiers have been implicated in recent atrocities and Defense Minister Tièna Coulibaly, formerly Mali’s ambassador in Washington, quickly ordered an investigation by military prosecutors.

Fears of violence have, of course, raised concerns about whether the election can be deemed credible. While the importance of the legitimacy of the process cannot be underestimated, one should be careful of those whose motives for raising questions may be self-serving. Here, details matter. Much has been made of the potential for insecurity in parts of the country disenfranchising voters. While Malians have organized 23,041 polling stations for the 8,000,642 registered voters across the country as well as abroad, the numbers of those impacted by the violence, while important, is less than might appear by simply looking at a map. At a news conference after the polls closed, a campaign manager for Soumaïla Cissé, viewed by most observers as the leading challenger to the incumbent, claimed that 644 polling stations had not been able to open because of insecurity. However, since he did not specify where these places were, it is impossible to determine the magnitude of the problem alleged. For example, together, the Gao, Tombouctou, and Kidal regions—an area larger than Texas and Oklahoma combined—constitute two-thirds of the territory of Mali and has been the stage for much of the conflict since the beginning of this decade. Yet, the three regions are home to less than 9 percent of registered voters, a figure not much larger than the proportion of the electorate in the diaspora (who, under Malian law, are entitled to vote in specially-organized polling stations where large émigré communities are found).

Furthermore, it is worth noting that if voter turnout seems disappointing, the figures should be taken in historical perspective: since the advent of democracy in Mali in 1992, voter participation in the first round of a presidential election has exceeded 50 percent only once, in 2013, when just over 51 percent of registered voters cast a ballot. In the prior four elections, turnout never exceeded 40 percent (and, in fact, twice did not even reach 30 percent)—and this was during a period when jihadist terrorism was not that big of a concern. Whatever the final level of voter participation, the deployment of some 30,000 police and military personnel across the country to provide security permitted what the correspondent for Le Monde described as “an almost normal voting day” despite the isolated attacks by militants, a judgment echoed by international election observers who, according to Jeune Afrique, noted that “overall the vote was calm in the capital, Bamako, and no major incidents were reported.”

Perhaps the most significant demographic bloc courted by the candidates in the run-up to election day was the country’s young people: more than 60 percent of the population is under the age of 25 and many of them were choosing a president for the first time. For many of these young voters, the main issues revolve around jobs and opportunities. Notwithstanding the positive macroeconomic trends and significant natural resources—inter alia, the country is the third-largest gold producer in Africa—Mali still ranks 175^th out of 188 countries and territories on the UN Human Development Index for 2017. The next president will have to make these economic and social challenges as much a priority as the security threats if the latter is not to worsen.

Procedurally, the election process is much improved from previous polls and several safeguards have been put into place to ensure its integrity. Each polling station during the vote was manned by a chairman, two assistants, an official observer for the majority party, and an official observer for the political opposition. The voter roll, complete with a photograph of each voter, are displayed at each polling station, corresponding to the biometric identification cards which were distributed across the country. The chairman and the two official observers in each polling place must sign the back of every ballot before it is given to voters and these same officials are present—along with designated representatives of all the candidates (there are twenty-four altogether)—for the counting of the votes. Presumably they would object if a ballot emerged without their signatures. All five of the officials and observers must sign three copies of the tabulated results, one of which is sent to the Constitutional Court, one to the election authorities at the Ministry of Territorial Administration, and one kept in place. Should no candidate win at least 50 percent of the votes cast, a runoff will be held between the two top vote getters fifteen days after the Constitutional Court certifies the result.

In short, with assistance from international partners, Malians have worked hard to organize elections which likely will prove to be more than “good enough” this time around. Despite logistical and security difficulties, polling places were up and running over the weekend in many of the places where lack of security had made it impossible to hold voting as recently as the local elections in November 2016. Now, with a bit of luck as well as some statesmanship on the part of the contenders, hopefully what will emerge is a president with a clear mandate to pursue peace and consolidate the institutions that are so important not only for Mali’s ongoing stabilization and future prosperity, but also the security of its West African neighborhood and beyond.

J. Peter Pham is vice president of the Atlantic Council and director of its Africa Center.

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In their remarks, Ibrahim and Zapata discussed the key findings of their report, which explains the main factors behind high-risk intercommunal conflicts in Mali, plausible scenarios that could lead to an escalation in violence against civilians, and a number of recommendations to mitigate these risks. In particular, the authors underscored four key objectives, ranging from suggested improvements to the Malian state and the implementation of the Algiers Accord to improved intelligence collection and dissemination strategies.

In his response, Keïta acknowledged that Mali has been in a rebuilding phase since the 2012 coup d’état, struggling with a dearth of intelligence and inefficient, albeit improving, monitoring and evaluation of crisis areas. He stressed that the government is working hard to address the challenges of security sector reform and regain the public’s trust; however, the reform process will take time. Keïta also discussed recent strides taken to improve professionalism within the Malian Armed Forces, as well as the need to improve the effective capacity of the United Nations’ Multidimensional Integrated Stabilization Mission in Mali (MINUSMA) to respond to security threats in Mali.

A discussion, moderated by Dr. J. Peter Pham, Atlantic Council vice president and Africa Center director, followed Ibrahim, Zapata, and Keïta’s remarks, focusing on the strategic review of the UN MINUSMA and the implications of the upcoming presidential elections, scheduled for July 29, 2018, on the security situation in and around Mali.

Also in attendance and participating in the discussion was Mr. James P. Rubin, former assistant secretary of state for public affairs; Mr. Christopher Runyan, acting deputy assistant administrator, Bureau for Africa, US Agency for International Development; and LTG William E. Ward, USA (Ret.), former commander, US Africa Command; as well as a number of US and non-US government officials, business leaders, and civil society actors.

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Dr. J. Peter Pham, Atlantic Council vice president and Africa Center director, introduced General Dao and Mr. Keïta and welcomed participants.

In their remarks, General Dao and Mr. Keïta discussed the worsening security situation in the Sahel region, noting that since 2018 began, sixteen terrorist incidents have cost over thirty civilian lives. Among other challenges, General Dao stressed that the Malian defense forces lack the necessary resources to improve the country’s defense and security apparatus, implement much needed reforms, and bring sustainable peace to Mali and the broader Sahel region. To combat this problem, General Dao called for greater engagement and support from the UN mission in Mali (MINUSMA) and other international forces operating in the region.

A discussion followed General Dao and Mr. Keïta’s remarks, focusing on the role of the G5 Sahel in counterterrorism operations across the region and the upcoming local, regional, and presidential elections that are scheduled to take place in Mali between April and July of this year.

General Dao and Mr. Keïta were accompanied by a delegation that included Amb. Mahamadou Nimaga, diplomatic advisor to the president and Mr. Ibrahim Biridogo, chargé d’affaires at the Embassy of Mali to the US. Also in attendance and participating in the roundtable were General William E. Ward, Former Commander, US Africa Command; Amb. David Shinn, former US Ambassador to Ethiopia and Burkina Faso; Amb. Phillip Carter III, former US Ambassador to Côte d’Ivoire and Guinea and the former Deputy to the Commander of the US Africa Command (AFRICOM); Amb. Bisa Williams, former US Ambassador to the Republic of Niger; and several other US government officials, congressional staffers, business leaders, and representatives of advocacy organizations.

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Bronwyn Bruton, director of programs and studies and deputy director of the Africa Center, welcomed guests and Lt. Col. Rudolph Atallah, USAF (Ret.), Africa Center senior fellow and former Africa counterterrorism director in the Office of the Secretary of Defense, introduced Acherif.

In his remarks, Acherif provided deep insight into the Azawad movement and the security situation in northern Mali. He stressed that the insecurity in the region is not a cause, but a result of political disputes, and pointed to the implementation of the 2015 Algiers Accord, which seeks to bring stability to northern regions of the country, as a way forward. In particular, he underscored the need for an inclusive, reconstituted defense force, arguing that the inefficiencies of the Malian army, coupled with a dearth of trust from local populations, constitute a major impediment to the implementation of the peace accord and the future prosperity of the region.

A discussion, moderated by Atallah, followed Acherif’s prepared remarks and focused on the Algiers Accord, recent human rights violations across the region, and the role of international actors in cooperatively tackling security threats across northern Mali.

The CMA delegation also included Mr. Attaye ag Mohamed, director of human rights and judicial affairs, Mr. Alghabass ag Intalla, former executive president of the CMA, and Mr. Mohamed Ould Mahmoud, spokesperson for the CMA. Also in attendance and participating in the roundtable were a number of current and former US and non-US government officials, business leaders, and civil society representatives.

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Retired Air Force Lt. Col. Rudy Atallah, a nonresident senior fellow in the Atlantic Council’s Africa Center, described this relationship as “not robust.” The consequences have been deadly.

“Whenever you do operations in and around villages outside of your base, not having adequate intelligence is very dangerous. Unfortunately, October 4^th proved that and we lost four very brave men because of it,” said Atallah, whom US President Donald J. Trump almost picked to serve as the senior director for Africa in the National Security Council.

On October 4, a small group of US troops and their Nigerien counterparts were ambushed by dozens of militants while returning from an intelligence-gathering operation. Four US soldiers and four Nigeriens were killed.

Atallah said the quality of intelligence has been hampered by the fact that the Nigerien government is not well-informed about developments beyond the capital. “They tend to have a very biased view about what is happening in the area,” he said.

The lack of adequate intelligence “creates issues because whenever you react to a situation you react from a very uninformed standpoint since the bulk of your information is coming from the host nation’s intelligence circle, and most of it is focused in and around the capital versus knowing what is really going on beyond the bush,” said Atallah.

One symptom of Niger’s limited intelligence focus is that the government has turned a blind eye toward developments involving the Fulani and the Tuareg, two tribes to which the extremist Jamaat Nusrat al Islam wal Muslimin (JNIM) has deep ties. JNIM’s Arabic name translates to “The Group to Support Islam and Muslims.” It was formed earlier this year following a merger of multiple militant groups.

“The fact that there are ethnic subdivisions [within JNIM] is interesting because it enables the extremists to have it both ways,” said J. Peter Pham, vice president for research and regional initiatives and director of the Africa Center. “They are part of a larger al Qaeda-sanctioned affiliate, on the other hand they also have an ethnic identity that feeds off geographic or ethnic grievances.”

What are US troops doing in Niger?

After the October 4 ambush, some senior US lawmakers expressed surprise at the fact that US troops were present in Niger.

The Pentagon confirmed that about 800 US troops are in Niger to help the government combat ISIS in the Greater Sahara. US military personnel also run a drone operation in Niger’s capital Niamey and Agadez, and support the Nigerien government in intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance (ISR) efforts.

“Niger has been part of US counterterrorism partnerships going back to the George W. Bush administration,” said Pham.

Pointing to the challenges in Niger, Pham said Nigerien armed forces are unable to patrol, much less fully secure, large parts of the country. “People are, essentially, living in ungoverned spaces,” he said.

The attack on US troops took place near Niger’s border with Mali and Burkina Faso. Porous borders and the presence of two major national parks in the region have created empty spaces for the militants to exploit, said Pham.

These security challenges are amplified by the fact that Niger routinely features at the bottom of global socioeconomic indices. Given these conditions, “getting a properly trained military is very much a big stretch for them,” said Pham.

While he acknowledged that they were “certainly not perfect,” Pham praised Niger as an overall good partner to the United States, but said “their ability to do anything is much more limited.” This is why, he added, the United States needs to remain engaged in Niger “because we need to deal with threats before they become larger threats.”

ISIS in Africa

The presence of a mélange of militant groups further complicates the situation in Niger.

Pham has been raising red flags about the situation in Niger since 2013. Testifying before the US House of Representatives’ Homeland Security Committee in March of 2017, he noted that the Nigerian military’s operations against Boko Haram had forced the extremists across the border into Cameroon and Niger.

As ISIS is driven out of its strongholds in Iraq, Syria, and Libya, its fighters are turning to the Sahel where ISIS-affiliated groups are active. In doing so, the militants have created challenges for governments and local populations alike. “That there are very real threats to security in this region is undoubted. You have a very active al Qaeda-linked group and you have a growing ISIS-linked group,” said Pham. “As ISIS is defeated elsewhere that threat is going to grow.”

Militant groups, while not fighting each other directly, are after the same pool of support. Terrorist attacks in the region have become deadlier as a consequence of what Pham described as a “strategic competition” between ISIS- and al Qaeda-affiliated groups to win recruits. While ISIS affiliation could, potentially, lead to more recruits for these groups, there little evidence of material support has emerged thus far.

A number of extremist groups in Africa have pledged allegiance to ISIS as a way to gain what Pham described as the “Good Housekeeping seal of approval.” In their attempt to gain ISIS’ endorsement, these groups have sought to outdo each other by committing even deadlier acts of terrorism. ISIS leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi required groups seeking affiliation to show that they were effective, which meant the violence went up, said Pham.

Pham pointed out that it was only in October of 2016, one year after Abu Walid al Sahrawi, former senior spokesman and self-proclaimed emir of a Sahara-based al-Qaeda-linked group, pledged loyalty to al-Baghdadi that ISIS designated al Sahrawi’s group as its “Greater Sahara” division. [The group has been blamed for the deadly ambush on US troops on October 4.] ISIS only accepted al Sahrawi’s “oath of fealty” after his group carried out attacks in the borderlands of Burkina Faso, Mali, and Niger—the very same area where the US forces were recently ambushed—Pham pointed out.

Is the ISIS threat overblown?

Atallah sought to downplay the ISIS threat noting that the group does not have a very big presence in Africa.

“Can they get more territory and recruits? They can, but they are not going to be any more effective than they were in the Middle East,” he said.

Atallah said that al-Sahrawi’s group has not claimed responsibility for the attack on the US troops. He believes that is because it is so small and attracting attention would be detrimental to al-Sahrawi’s long-term ambitions.

It is hard enough to find recruits in the region because unlike North Africans or Middle Easterners, it is very difficult to get sub-Saharan Africans ideologically motivated, said Atallah.

Pham, on the other hand, cautioned that the defeat of ISIS in Iraq, Syria, and Libya may change the calculus. He also added that the neglect of the peripheral areas by some of the African governments in the region created “social as well as geographical ungoverned spaces ripe for exploitation by extremists,” irrespective of whether they operate under the ISIS or the al Qaeda banner.

US policy options

The October 4 ambush is likely to prompt the Trump administration to take a closer look at its policies in Africa.

Atallah faulted the US approach to the situation in Niger, currently based on counterterrorism and military support. “We can throw as much money as we want at it, but the strategy is not a good one,” he said. He suggested a policy that focuses as much on the social dynamics of the problem as it does on killing terrorists.

Atallah said the Trump administration should prioritize appointing the “right Africanists” to government jobs and then develop new policies. “At present, all we’re doing is following the old policies from the Obama/Susan Rice years and that is not helping at all,” he said.

Ashish Kumar Sen is the deputy director of communications at the Atlantic Council. Follow him on Twitter @AshishSen.

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Atlantic Council Vice President and Africa Center Director Dr. J. Peter Pham welcomed guests and Africa Center Senior Fellow Lt. Col. Rudolph Atallah, USAF (Ret.), former Africa Counterterrorism Director in the Office of the Secretary of Defense, introduced Dr. Rhoubeid.

Rhoubeid provided an overview of the security situation and role of the Tuareg people in Niger, focusing specifically on the country’s northwestern region, which borders Mali. He suggested that Tuareg grievances about economic and political marginalization by the central government, which are amplified by dire economic and development realities, give militancy and criminality a “seductive” appeal for Niger’s youth.

The criminal and terrorist elements that operate across Niger and the Sahara are well-armed, culturally savvy, and organized, he noted. Rhoubeid described the Nigerien army as ill-equipped to take on these groups, which are buoyed by millions of dollars in revenue from the drug trade. But Rhoubeid eschewed a purely military solution to Niger’s security challenges, arguing that legitimate and accountable local governance was a vital piece of the puzzle.

A discussion, moderated by Atallah, followed Rhoubeid’s prepared remarks and focused on the role of the United States in cooperatively tackling security threats across the Sahel, as well as the impact of Niger’s neighbors Nigeria, Algeria, Mali, Libya, and Burkina Faso on regional security.

Also in attendance and participating in the roundtable were a number of current and former US government officials, business leaders, and civil society representatives.

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In his remarks, Keïta thanked international partners for their efforts to bring peace and security to Mali. He stressed that foreign military intervention in Mali has brought stability to the country and allowed it to get back on its feet after the 2012 coup d’état. Keïta spoke at length about the importance of international cooperation and partnerships, pointing to the many agreements Mali has made with its neighbors to combat cross-border terrorism and organized crime in the region. In addition, Keïta stressed the importance of the Group of Five Sahel States in pooling multinational resources to combat regional economic and security issues.

Speaking on the economy, Keïta applauded his country’s overall success despite adversity, highlighting Mali’s continued growth, relatively low debt, and improved ranking on the World Bank’s ease of doing business index. Keïta also emphasized his government’s commitment to developing Mali’s agricultural sector, noting that 15 percent of the budget is allocated to agriculture and rural development.

A discussion followed the president’s prepared remarks.

The Malian delegation also included H.E. Boubou Cissé, Minister of Economy and Finance; Hon. Karim Keïta, Chairman, Commission on National Defense, Security, and Civil Protection; Hon. Moustapha Ben Barka, Deputy Secretary General at the Office of the President; and H.E. Issa Konfourou, Permanent Representative of Mali to the United Nations, among others. Also in attendance and participating in the roundtable were Atlantic Council Board Directors Ambassador Mary Carlin Yates, Former Special Assistant to the President and Senior Director for African Affairs and Special Assistant for Strategic Planning at the National Security Council, and Mr. Ahmed Charai, Chairman, Maroc Télématique; Atlantic Council International Advisory Board Members Mr. Mehmet Nazif Günal, Founder, Chairman of the Board, and President, MNG Group of Companies, and Mr. Tewodros Ashenafi, Founder, Chairman, and CEO, Southwest Holdings; and a number of US and non-US government officials, business leaders, and civil society actors.

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Atlantic Council Vice President and Africa Center Director Dr. J. Peter Pham and Mr. Scott Eisner, President of the US-Africa Business Center at the US Chamber of Commerce, welcomed participants.

In his remarks, Kaboré reaffirmed Burkina Faso’s commitment to promoting justice, the rule of law, and shared prosperity for its people. He highlighted the ongoing implementation of the National Economic and Social Development Plan, which seeks to structurally reform the Burkinabe economy to achieve strong, sustainable, and inclusive growth for all. Kaboré also underscored the success of his country’s burgeoning mining sector, which has contributed substantially to Burkina Faso’s economic upswing in recent years, as evidence of his country’s increasing attractiveness to foreign investors.

In response to the August 2017 terrorist attacks in Ouagadougou, Kaboré underscored that Burkina Faso is doing everything it can to curb the evolving threat of terrorism, with a particular focus on the country’s north. The president further reaffirmed his country’s commitment to the Group of Five Sahel States to combat cross-border terrorism and organized crime in the region.

A discussion followed the president’s prepared remarks.

The Burkinabé delegation also included H.E. Laure Zongo Hien, Minister of Women, National Solidarity, and Family, H.E. Eric Tiare, Permanent Representative of Burkina Faso to the United Nations, and H.E. Seydou Kaboré, Ambassador to the United States. Also in attendance and participating in the roundtable were Atlantic Council Board Director Mr. Ahmed Charai, Chairman, Maroc Télématique; Atlantic Council International Advisory Board Member Mr. Mehmet Nazif Günal, Founder, Chairman of the Board, and President, MNG Group of Companies; and CEOs from various investment, mining, and renewable energy companies.

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In his remarks, Youssef discussed the complexities of the protracted conflict in the Lake Chad Basin and the neutral, intermediary role that the ICRC has played in previously-inaccessible civilian areas in the region. He spoke in depth about the armed conflict and violence in northeastern Nigeria, which has spilled over to northern Cameroon, western Chad, and south-east Niger, displacing approximately two million people and severely damaging the regional economy in the process. Youssef further emphasized that a primarily military response is not sufficient to curtail Boko Haram insurgents in the region, citing fundamental humanitarian assistance, emergency mental health and psychosocial support, building resilience in vulnerable communities, and prompting transitional justice initiatives as four pillars of what must be a comprehensive, multifaceted solution.

Africa Center Director of Programs and Studies and Deputy Director Bronwyn Bruton introduced Youssef and moderated the ensuing discussion, which included attendees from the US government, the non-profit sector, and academia.

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Broadly speaking, the deal marks the latest in the EU’s attempts to outsource restrictive migration policies that prevent asylum seekers from reaching European territory. In the Malian context, several of the deal’s themes are problematic and shed doubt on its overall impact on migration flows.

The EU’s strategy for reducing African migration flows assumes that increases in development aid will create economic opportunity, thereby reducing the number of Africans traveling to Europe to look for work.  This assumption is problematic for two reasons. First, aid takes a long time to create economic growth. In the short run, it’s unlikely that aid will have any noticeable effect on people’s decision to migrate. Second, as aid does start to encourage growth, it may have the opposite effect on migration. In very poor countries such as Mali, emigration tends to increase with household income, as more families are able to afford the expensive up-front cost of migration.

Further, in the Malian case, the EU’s plan to employ registration systems, identity cards, and biometric passports to control emigration is unrealistic. Malian asylum seekers tend to reach Europe via remote trans-Saharan routes across the northern Algerian border. While Mali’s porous borders—and the unimpeded flow of arms, drugs, and jihadist militias—have certainly contributed to the country’s woes, adequately policing Mali’s remote border deep in the Sahara Desert would be a monumental task. Presently, the Malian military, with the ongoing assistance of French forces and United Nations Multidimensional Integrated Stabilization Mission in Mali (MINUSMA), struggles to control territory outside of the major urban centers in the northern part of the country. Controlling the rural northern border areas to the extent that the government would be able to prevent Malians from leaving the country will be unattainable for a long time.

Finally, as the Malian government struggles to contain the plethora of militant Islamist groups active in the country, there are real ethical concerns about returning Malians back to areas where they could be under threat. Human rights organizations have documented the ongoing threat to civilians in Mali, by both Islamist militant groups and abusive state security services. In many cases, asylum seekers deported back to their home communities would be in danger.

One of the main problems with the EU’s “money-for-migration” deals is that they embolden governments to introduce repressive policies in the name of discouraging emigrants or fighting the smugglers that transit them. In the Malian context in particular, this quid-pro-quo provides incentives that could ultimately work against efforts to stabilize the North. In many of Mali’s northern regions, the central government has consistently struggled to win the trust and the support of populations that have historical felt marginalized and victimized. The perception of government oppression in these regions has contributed to episodic attempts at independence, the latest of which destabilized the central government to the extent that Islamist groups were able to take control over large swaths of the country. Going forward, the Malian government’s battle will be to develop its own legitimacy in the eyes of those marginalized communities.

In this regard, the EU deal and an increased focus on border management and migration control is unlikely to help. The heavy-handed tactics by Malian security forces in response to the country’s ongoing Islamist insurgency exacerbate grievances in marginalized communities. Islamist groups like the Macina Liberation Front have already been able to recruit amongst young Fulani populations disaffected by abuses by Malian security forces in the central part of the country. Providing the Malian government with more incentives to crack down in communities already antipathetic to the government will only exacerbate the insecurity. And more insecurity will ultimately prove counterproductive to the EU’s goal of reducing emigration flows out of the country.

Europe’s latest deal with Mali will not substantially impact the country’s emigration rates. If Europe is serious about dissuading young Malians from risking their lives crossing the Sahara and the Mediterranean, it should recalibrate its approach. 

Julian Wyss was assistant director of the Atlantic Council’s Africa Center. Follow him at @JulianSWyss

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We must defend ourselves against terrorism.

Since the Madrid bombing of 2004, there have been more than 30 terrorist attacks in Europe – 14 in the last year alone. More than 600 innocent people died in cities like Paris, Brussels, Nice, or Ansbach.

Just as we have stood shoulder to shoulder in grief, so must we stand united in our response.

The barbaric acts of the past year have shown us again what we are fighting for – the European way of life. In face of the worst of humanity we have to stay true to our values, to ourselves. And what we are is democratic societies, plural societies, open and tolerant.

But that tolerance cannot come at the price of our security.

That is why my Commission has prioritised security from day one – we criminalised terrorism and foreign fighters across the EU, we cracked down on the use of firearms and on terrorist financing, we worked with internet companies to get terrorist propaganda offline and we fought radicalisation in Europe’s schools and prisons.

But there is more to be done.

We need to know who is crossing our borders.

That is why we will defend our borders with the new European Border and Coast Guard, which is now being formalised by Parliament and Council, just nine months after the Commission proposed it. Frontex already has over 600 agents on the ground at the borders with Turkey in Greece and over 100 in Bulgaria. Now, the EU institutions and the Member States should work very closely together to quickly help set up the new Agency. I want to see at least 200 extra border guards and 50 extra vehicles deployed at the Bulgarian external borders as of October.

We will defend our borders, as well, with strict controls, adopted by the end of the year, on everyone crossing them. Every time someone enters or exits the EU, there will be a record of when, where and why.

By November, we will propose a European Travel Information System – an automated system to determine who will be allowed to travel to Europe. This way we will know who is travelling to Europe before they even get here.

And we all need that information. How many times have we heard stories over the last months that the information existed in one database in one country, but it never found its way to the authority in another that could have made the difference?

Border security also means that information and intelligence exchange must be prioritised. For this, we will reinforce Europol – our European agency supporting national law enforcement – by giving it better access to databases and more resources. A counter terrorism unit that currently has a staff of 60 cannot provide the necessary 24/7 support.

A Europe that protects also defends our interests beyond our borders.

The facts are plain: The world is getting bigger. And we are getting smaller.

Today we Europeans make up 8% of the world population – we will only represent 5% in 2050. By then you would not see a single EU country among the top world economies. But the EU together? We would still be topping the charts.

Our enemies would like us to fragment.

Our competitors would benefit from our division.

Only together are we and will we remain a force to be reckoned with.

Still, even though Europe is proud to be a soft power of global importance, we must not be naïve. Soft power is not enough in our increasingly dangerous neighbourhood.

Take the brutal fight over Syria. Its consequences for Europe are immediate. Attacks in our cities by terrorists trained in Daesh camps. But where is the Union, where are its Member States, in negotiations towards a settlement?

Federica Mogherini, our High Representative and my Vice-President, is doing a fantastic job. But she needs to become our European Foreign Minister via whom all diplomatic services, of big and small countries alike, pool their forces to achieve leverage in international negotiations. This is why I call today for a European Strategy for Syria. Federica should have a seat at the table when the future of Syria is being discussed. So that Europe can help rebuild a peaceful Syrian nation and a pluralistic, tolerant civil society in Syria.

Europe needs to toughen up. Nowhere is this truer than in our defence policy.

Europe can no longer afford to piggy-back on the military might of others or let France alone defend its honour in Mali.

We have to take responsibility for protecting our interests and the European way of life.

Over the last decade, we have engaged in over 30 civilian and military EU missions from Africa to Afghanistan. But without a permanent structure we cannot act effectively. Urgent operations are delayed. We have separate headquarters for parallel missions, even when they happen in the same country or city. It is time we had a single headquarters for these operations.

We should also move towards common military assets, in some cases owned by the EU. And, of course, in full complementarity with NATO.

The business case is clear. The lack of cooperation in defence matters costs Europe between €25 billion and €100 billion per year, depending on the areas concerned. We could use that money for so much more.

It can be done. We are building a multinational fleet of air tankers. Let’s replicate this example.

For European defence to be strong, the European defence industry needs to innovate. That is why we will propose before the end of the year a European Defence Fund, to turbo boost research and innovation.

The Lisbon Treaty enables those Member States who wish, to pool their defence capabilities in the form of a permanent structured cooperation. I think the time to make use of this possibility is now. And I hope that our meeting at 27 in Bratislava a few days from now will be the first, political step in that direction.

Because it is only by working together that Europe will be able to defend itself at home and abroad.

Excerpt from the State of the Union speech by the President of the European Commission Jean-Claude Juncker, September 14, 2016.

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The Nigerien government and the Millennium Challenge Corporation (MCC) on July 29 enacted the investment compact—the first of its kind for Niger.

“The main problem in Niger is agricultural production and we want to focus, in particular, on the livelihoods of agriculturists and farmers—and that is at the very heart of the [MCC] program,” Rafini said at the Atlantic Council in Washington on July 28.

“This program will be of great benefit to Niger… [and it] will significantly improve the living standards of the Nigerien population,” he added.

Rafini spoke at a roundtable discussion hosted by the Atlantic Council’s Africa Center. J. Peter Pham, director of the Council’s Africa Center, introduced and moderated the discussion.

The nearly $450 million investment agreement defines a wide-ranging partnership between the United States and Niger. Irrigation system improvement, road construction, natural resource management policies, and training programs are core areas that the compact will address. The compact also calls on Niger to maintain a commitment to good governance and respect rule of law.

Niger has endured extended periods of political instability since it gained independence from colonial France in 1958. The country has stabilized following a 2010 coup d’état in which the military established a transition council, implemented a new constitution, and ultimately held elections that were seen as transparent and fair by the international community.

Regional insecurity

Boko Haram—a terrorist organization affiliated with the Islamic State of Iraq and al-Sham (ISIS)—has operated across Niger, Nigeria, Chad, and Cameroon since 2010. The group has forced nearly 2.3 million people to flee from Nigeria into neighboring Niger and Chad since May of 2013. Humanitarian aid efforts from the United Nations (UN) in the region—in particular Borno state in northeastern Nigeria—have been suspended amid continued attacks by Boko Haram militants on Nigerian military and UN convoys.

Despite the group’s stronghold in the neighboring northeast of Nigeria, Rafini noted that efforts to stabilize the conflict in Niger have been successful.

“At this stage, populations in Niger are actually starting to feel more confident and they feel that the Niger forces have been very helpful in stabilizing the area and have been bringing peace and stability back in order to completely eradicate the Boko Haram threat,” said Rafini.

“Our very security depends on the security of our neighbors. It is Niger’s duty to contribute to this process…of establishing peace and security in the region,” he added.

Through its provisions toward improving agricultural and infrastructure sectors, the MCC compact will strengthen the strategy of countering violent extremism in Niger and bolster long-term regional security, according to Rafini.

“It’s important to mention the very tight link between security and poverty. A number of countries have taken arrangements to improve their economies and spur investment, which are necessary to instill greater hope in our younger generations because…remaining idle and unemployed makes these young people much more vulnerable to radicalism,” he said. “It is very important to focus on poverty and eliminate it.”

Niger has continually ranked on the low-end of the United Nations Human Development Index—a composite metric that ranks countries based on gross domestic product, life expectancy, and access to quality education.

Rafini hopes Niger will move in a positive and sustainable economic direction through the implementation of such investment compacts with organizations like the MCC.

“The ultimate objective is for no Nigerien to go hungry…We are moving toward eliminating poverty entirely. It is a difficult thing but we must provide measures to alleviate the population of this suffering. We are well on our way to success,” said Rafini.

Mitch Hulse is an editorial assistant at the Atlantic Council. You can follow him on Twitter @mitchhulse.

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Africa Center Director Dr. J. Peter Pham welcomed attendees, introduced Rafini, and, following the prime minister’s remarks, moderated the discussion.

In his remarks, Rafini outlined the development progress the Republic of Niger has made since constitutional order was restored and President Mahamadou Issoufou was elected in 2011. In addition, the prime minister highlighted the threat of food insecurity and drought in the Sahel, and the importance of agriculture for the economy. He also touched on the security challenges facing the country, including, notably, the ongoing threat of terrorism and human trafficking concerns. Finally, he thanked the United States and France for the continued military and intelligence cooperation in addressing these security challenges.

Participants at the roundtable included His Excellency Ouhoumoudou Mahamadou, minister and chief of staff to the president of the Republic of Niger; Her Excellency Kane Aichatou Boulama, minister of planning from the Republic of Niger; Her Excellency Hassana Alidou, ambassador from the Republic of Niger to the US; Gado Mahamadou, chief of staff to the prime minister; Wandeba Botourou, Nigerien high commissioner to the 3N Initiative; Dr. Ahmat Jidoud, minister delegate of the budget for the Republic of Niger; Peter Barlerin, deputy assistant secretary, US Department of State; Amanda Dory, deputy assistant secretary of defense for African affairs, US Department of Defense; The Honorable Eunice Reddick, US ambassador to the Republic of Niger; and Ambassador Bisa Williams, former US ambassador to the Republic of Niger.

For more on the event, see “Investment Compact Brings Hope to Niger.”

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In her remarks, Alidou identified several successes relating to the election, noting specifically increased youth and female participation, before outlining the Nigerien government’s post-election priorities. In particular, Alidou underscored the government’s focus on improving education, combatting malnutrition, and providing healthcare. She also acknowledged the daunting regional security challenges, including the continued threat posed by insecurity in Libya and Mali, and noted the important link between security and development in the Nigerien context.

Also speaking at the event was Maman Bachir Fifi, Deputy Chief of Mission at the Nigerien Embassy.

Mr. Maman Bachir Fifi, deputy chief of mission at the Nigerien Embassy

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“Mali today is as fragile as it was before the coup in 2012,” said Peter Pham, director of the Africa Studies Program at the Atlantic Council in Washington, referring to the military power grab that occurred as a rebellion in the north gained strength. France intervened the following year, after Islamist fightersseized control of a large chunk of territory.

Read the full article here.

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Though military pressure largely drove Islamist militants from cities, they regrouped in the desert areas, said J. Peter Pham, director of the Africa Center at the Washington-based Atlantic Council.

“Unfortunately, this (hotel) is a likely target” because it is popular with international guests, Pham said.

Read the full article here.

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J. Peter Pham, director of the Africa Center of the Atlantic Council, a policy research group in Washington, said he was not surprised by the assault on the Radisson hotel.

Although the French-led military intervention in early 2013 ousted militants from their control of the northern two-thirds of Mali, Mr. Pham said the African Union and United Nations forces that largely replaced French troops in much of the country have seen little more than garrison duty in a few towns.

“The militants have also shifted strategy away from attempting to seize and hold territory to attacking high-profile targets that have the double objective of hitting foreigners and garnering attention,” Mr. Pham said.

Read the full article here.

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Still, it isn’t clear the schism will be as deep in Mali as it has been in Iraq and Syria. Malian Islamist groups have traded fighters, fought together, and trained each other in ways that make it difficult for foreign analysts to keep up, said Rudy Atallah, former Africa counterterrorism director at the U.S. Defense Department, and a senior Africa researcher at the Atlantic Council in Washington.

“In terms of who’s affiliated with who, that’s just really loose: One day they can be in one camp, and another day in one camp, and another day in one camp, and it keeps shuffling,” he said. “It’s going to continue to be confusing for analysts to say who’s doing what where, but the characters will stay the same.”

Read the full article here.

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The hotel siege illustrates how Islamic extremists in Mali have changed their tactics in recent years, according to J. Peter Pham, director of the Africa Center of the Atlantic Council, a policy research group in Washington.

[…]

Since then, though, African Union and United Nations forces have largely replaced French troops in much of the country, and Mr. Pham said that those forces have done little more than garrison a few towns, leaving vast stretches of the country where extremists can and have regrouped.

“The militants have also shifted strategy away from attempting to seize and hold territory to attacking high-profile targets that have the double objective of hitting foreigners and garnering attention,” Mr. Pham said.

Read the full article here.

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Though military pressure largely drove Islamist militants from cities, they have regrouped in the desert areas, said J. Peter Pham, director of the Africa Center at the Washington-based Atlantic Council.

“Unfortunately, this (hotel) is a likely target” because it is popular with international guests such as U.N. workers, Pham said.

Read the full article here.

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Watch the full broadcast here.

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In the case of France, some positive developments have occurred since early 2015. Among these are President François Hollande’s decisions to: increase defense spending by €3.8 billion ($4.25 billion) over the remainder of the 2014-2019 defense program law (loi de programmation militaire, or LPM); raise the army’s total deployable force from 66,000 to 77,000 soldiers; and keep some 18,000 of the 34,000 military and defense civilian personnel that the government had planned to cut by 2019.

Still, when 400 top French government and military officials, parliamentarians, and defense industry chiefs gathered in Strasbourg, September 14-15, for their 13th annual “summer defense college,” the relatively upbeat tone of official presentations could not mask lingering concerns over gaps between the ambitions and means of la grande nation.

Strategic priority: fighting terrorism

The Wales Summit Declaration listed “Russia’s aggressive actions against Ukraine” ahead of “growing instability in our southern neighborhood” as challenges to Euro-Atlantic security. But Defense Minister Yves Le Drian was clear, in his keynote address in Strasbourg, about France’s current strategic priority: the “fight against the terrorist threat.” Starting with the intervention in Mali in January 2013, he explained, “operations to neutralize armed terrorist groups” have become one of the top missions—if not the leading one—of the French armed forces. Under Opération Barkhane, 3500 French military are conducting counter-terrorism actions across a vast swath of the Sahel.

Meanwhile, according to Le Drian, the rise of Daesh (French officialdom’s preferred descriptor for the so-called Islamic State) has “changed the nature of jihadist terrorism.” Beyond spreading terror through limited and dispersed attacks, its adherents now constitute a “terrorist army” that is seizing territory and resources. This new threat to France’s strategic environment, he continued, explains Hollande’s decision last year to join the international coalition fighting Daesh in Iraq and, more recently, to order French surveillance flights over Syria, “which today is the most formidable center of terrorism.” (On September 27, Hollande announced the first French strikes against Daesh in Syria).

Moreover, the dramatic terrorist attacks in Paris in January 2015—and others that have occurred or been prevented since then—confirmed the linkages between internal and external security. Within a few days of the January attacks, France deployed 10,000 soldiers in Opération Sentinelle to protect religious, cultural, and other sensitive sites in Paris and elsewhere from potential terrorist actions. This marked, in the defense minister’s view, an “unprecedented turning point in our army’s history.” Although Sentinelle was subsequently reduced to 7,000 soldiers, it has been extended indefinitely. As a result, the defense ministry and other concerned government bodies are working to update, by next January, formal doctrine on the use of the armed forces on the national territory.

It is understandable that Le Drian would focus his remarks in Strasbourg–as did the Chief of Defense, General Pierre de Villiers, and prominent French parliamentarians and former ministers–on security and humanitarian challenges emanating from conflicts and failing states in the Sahel and Middle East. However, that there was virtually no mention of Russia, Iran, or China during the two-day event was a surprise to this American observer and, apparently, to several French attendees, as well. After all, those three countries had received considerable attention in the Hollande government’s 2013 White Book on Defense and National Security, and China figured prominently in the defense ministry’s 2014 report on French national interests and strategy in the Asia-Pacific region. More recently, France has been at the forefront of diplomatic attempts to close the Iranian nuclear deal and (alongside Germany) staunch the Russia-Ukraine conflict. Meanwhile, its military has participated in NATO’s Readiness Action Plan and complemented those efforts through bilateral exercises with Poland.

Capabilities: spotlight on intelligence

A succession of French defense leaders have argued that their country–as a nuclear power and a state willing, if necessary, to conduct prompt and unilateral “first entry” operations–must have a robust and “autonomous” capacity for intelligence collection and analysis to support national decision-makers. But as officials emphasized in Strasbourg, the number, diversity, and fast-changing nature of new threats have made intelligence tools even more critical to achieving strategic, operational, and tactical success.

To underscore the point, high-level briefers described how improved collection and analysis capabilities and inter-service coordination allowed French intelligence services to: debunk reports in the spring of 2014 of an impending general Russian offensive against eastern Ukraine; “find, follow, and finish” jihadist extremists in the Sahel; and target Daesh in Iraq while reducing the risk of collateral damage.

As officials pointed out, the defense spending hike, which the parliament approved in July, will be used, in part, to add several hundred intelligence personnel to the 15,000 already in the various services. France also will acquire a second MQ-9 “Reaper” system with three drones and, over the next several years, plans to deploy a third optical imagery satellite (to be developed in cooperation with Germany) and its first satellite for electromagnetic signals collection. In addition, it will intensify efforts to counter growing cyber threats and, as Le Drian put it diplomatically, “have the capability to take action (emphasis added) across cyberspace.”

Intelligence budgets and capabilities have not been the only concern of French parliamentarians, media, and non-government specialists. So Le Drian and other senior officials reassured them that the recently approved update of French laws governing surveillance practices will prevent their services from being outmatched by increasingly sophisticated “jihadi networks” while still “respecting the public’s liberties guaranteed by [our] Constitution.”

Leo Michel a Non-Resident Senior Fellow at the Atlantic Council’s Brent Scowcroft Center on International Security. This is the first piece of a three part series.

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In recent years, we have witnessed the dramatic rise of Boko Haram in Nigeria and its expansion into neighboring Cameroon, Chad, and Niger. In addition to sharing borders, these four countries have another valuable asset in common: Lake Chad. The resource remains the primary source of freshwater for irrigation projects in the region, and the Lake’s basin remains one of the world’s most important agricultural heritage sites, providing a lifeline to about 30 million people.

A combination of climate change, drought, and inefficient resource usage has led to a 90 percent decrease in Lake Chad’s size, from nearly 25,000 square kilometers (about the size of the State of Maryland) in 1963 to less than 1,500 square kilometers in 2001. Lake Chad has always been subject to seasonal fluctuations in area and volume, but a combination of climate change and exponentially increasing demand for water has caused an alarming and permanent reduction in recent decades.

This massive reduction of the Lake has resulted in less water availability, decreased agricultural outputs for surrounding communities, and an increase in livestock and fisheries mortality. Moreover, as the human population that depends on the Lake’s ecosystem for survival surges in size, the challenge of decreasing freshwater availability grows more and more acute.

The dire situation of Lake Chad caught the attention of former US Vice President Al Gore who, in his book An Inconvenient Truth, showed pictures of the lake shrinking. In 2009, the UN Food and Agriculture Organization called the situation an “ecological catastrophe” that would contribute to humanitarian disaster if unaddressed.

But the crises caused by the shrinkage of Lake Chad have been aggravated by yet another regional disaster: the rise of terrorist group Boko Haram.

Security problems add to the strain

According to the International Committee of the Red Cross, Boko Haram’s violence has displaced more than a million people around Lake Chad. They are struggling to find food, water, and healthcare, and many are desperately searching for separated members of their families. Additionally, nearby communities’ resources—already stretched to the breaking point due to Lake Chad’s ecological challenges—have come under even greater strain as a result of the influx of displaced persons. Sharing scarce resources often causes friction and even violence between host communities and displaced persons; it remains to be seen whether this concern will manifest itself in the Lake Chad scenario.

Both humanitarian and security challenges are straining local government resources and capacity. In Niger, preliminary estimates from the World Bank suggest that the fiscal impact of increased security needs and the hosting of displaced persons could cost the country one percent of its annual GDP, crowding out other public investment priorities.

Regional institutions must be strengthened

In the 1990s, Nigeria, Niger, and Chad combined their respective military forces into the Multinational Joint Task Force (MNJTF), organized to tackle cross-border security issues in the Lake Chad region. Currently, the MNJTF is entirely focused on the fight against Boko Haram. During the Summit of Heads of State and Government of the Lake Chad Basin Commission (LCBC) held in Abuja, Nigeria on June 11, Nigerian President Muhammadu Buhari recommitted his country to the Boko Haram fight, offering $100 million in funding to the regional fighting force.

On the development side, the LCBC, a regional organization comprising Lake Chad’s neighboring countries, oversees water and other natural resource usage in the basin. Its mandate is to manage the Lake and shared water resources of the Basin, preserve the ecosystems of the Lake, and promote regional integration, peace, and security across the Basin.

Unfortunately, since its inception in 1964, the LCBC has experienced difficulties mobilizing adequate resources to fulfill their mission. In April 2014, LCBC countries held a donor meeting in Bologna, Italy to fundraise for a five-year investment plan aimed at revitalizing the Basin (the plan runs until 2017). The plan consists of fifteen programs, at a cost of €925 million. The African Development Bank committed €80 million to the plan, and other partners at the donor meeting also expressed their interest. Unfortunately, the plan’s funding goals remain unmet, though the LCBC might consider tapping into the World Bank Global Environment Facility Program or the UN’s Green Climate Fund to leverage additional resources.

The plan’s key goals are to reverse the degradation of Lake Chad’s resources and ensure the preservation of its ecosystem. Its objectives include raising the quantity and quality of the Lake’s water, increasing the productivity of farmers, fishers, and herders operating around the Basin, strengthening regional integration and cooperation processes, and actively engaging local people in decision making.

In the medium term, the LCBC must convince its partners that the Commission is capable of addressing Lake Chad’s development challenges, and it must solicit the resources needed to do so effectively. One way the LCBC could increase its credibility and relevance would be to give more attention not only to technical matters, but also to political issues. The LCBC, for example, could focus on improving local governance in the region and build on its role as a convener of the region’s leadership to ensure permanent regional cooperation and, hopefully, international support for their efforts to support a healthy and sustainable Basin.

The way forward

In the current context, LCBC countries might seize the opportunity of the 21st Session of the Conference of the Parties to the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change (“COP 21” for short), currently planned for December 2015 in Paris, to increase global awareness about the ecological, humanitarian, and security challenges facing Lake Chad.

It is fair to assume that African countries cannot afford the disappearance of Lake Chad, nor should the world allow the birth of an African “Aral Sea.” The LCBC plan amounts to less than a billion dollars, but its implementation could greatly contribute to revitalizing the Lake and supporting the livelihoods of millions of people. To ensure a successful and sustainable solution, more ambitious efforts are needed.

Abdoul Salam Bello is a senior fellow at the Africa Center. You can follow him on Twitter @as_bello.

The post Why Lake Chad matters: Tackling climate change, development, and security appeared first on Atlantic Council.

Heavily armed men stormed into a hotel popular with European military pilots in central Mali, officials there said on Friday, in what appeared to be the latest attempt by al Qaeda allies to wrest control over the north of that country.

[…]

“In a nutshell this was just a long time coming,” said Rudy Atallah, former Africa counterterrorism director at the US Defense Department and a senior Africa researcher at the Atlantic Council in Washington. “They’re going to keep doing this until things start to give in, and the Islamists start to gain ground.”

Read the full article here.

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After a welcome by Africa Center Director J. Peter Pham, Alidou spoke about the importance and value of regional cooperation against threats like Boko Haram, Al Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb, deteriorating conditions in Libya, and the Mediterranean migrant crisis. She noted that security and development cannot be divorced from one another, and that Niger must work toward both.

Alidou highlighted Niger’s development successes through “Nigeriens Nourishing Nigeriens,” the country’s national food security and sustainable agriculture strategy, and the country’s “Renaissance” development plan for infrastructure, education, and health. Niger recently achieved the Millennium Development Goals for food security and reduced infant mortality—a significant feat for a country which ranked last on the UN’s 2013 Human Development Index.

She noted that Niger is working to attract private investment and modernize its agricultural economy for eventual export. The Government of Niger also recently finalized a deal to construct a much-desired railway to the coast of Benin.

Alidou has an extensive background in education and previously served as the Regional Director of the United Nations Educational, Scientific, and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) covering Nigeria, Benin, Togo, Ghana, Liberia, Sierra Leone, Côte d’Ivoire, and Guinea. She presented her letters credential to President Barack Obama in February 2015.

After delivering her prepared remarks, Alidou engaged with participants in a lively discussion, moderated by Pham. Also in attendance from the Embassy of Niger were Deputy Chief of Mission Boubacar Moussa Rilla and Defense Attaché Colonel Abdoulaye Badie. 

The post Discussion with new ambassador of Niger appeared first on Atlantic Council.

“There seems to be evidence that the Movement for the Liberation of Macina arose among ethnic Fulani Islamists influenced by preachers with links to Iyad ag Ghali,” said J. Peter Pham, head of the Atlantic Council’s Africa Center. Ghali was the founder of Ansar Dine and had been lying low until August 2014, when he appeared in an AQIM video calling on Muslims to rise up against France, “which detests Islam.”

Witnesses say the fighters do appear to be of Fulani ethnicity, which is logical because the group’s name recalls a 19th century Fulani state, led by a Muslim preacher.

“The use of the name and appeal to the history of Macina may be a vehicle to make Iyad ag Ghali’s Islamism more palatable to Fulani,” Pham said. “Whether there is more to it or not is too early to tell.”

Read the full article here.

The post Pham on the New Terror Group in Mali appeared first on Atlantic Council.

Terror groups operating with impunity in the country’s north are increasingly attacking United Nations (UN) and Western targets and staging attacks as far south as the capital Bamako. At the same time, the international community is racing to break the cycle of northern rebellions by convincing Tuareg separatist groups to sign a peace agreement with the Malian government by mid-May.

In his remarks, Attaye detailed the latest developments in the region, and noted that, following recent violations of the truce lines by government-aligned militia and the failure of UN peacekeepers to stop their advances, clashes in northern Mali between the government and separatist factions threaten the ongoing peace process. He also expressed concern over distrust between the Malian government and disparate rebel groups as an impediment to finalizing the peace process.

The discussion was moderated by Africa Center Senior Fellow Rudolph Atallah. 

The post Northern Mali’s critical moment appeared first on Atlantic Council.

The post Update on security in Nigeria and the campaign against Boko Haram appeared first on Atlantic Council.

Relief groups have built two refugee camps—Sayam Forage and Kablewa—in Niger that thus far are distant enough from the border to protect refugees from the violence and keep Boko Haram from plundering or recruiting in the camps. But Boko Haram’s recent incursions have displaced local Nigeriens as well as many of the Nigerian refugees who have not made it to the camps.

Making matters worse, the insecurity has significantly curtailed humanitarian relief work in those zones, prompting the UN High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) to call for “urgent humanitarian access to refugees and internally displaced people.” There are thousands of displaced people on the move in Niger with little access to aid.

Cameroon is in a similar situation. UNHCR has registered more than 40,000 Nigerian refugees in Nigeria’s neighbor to the east, many of whom have been transported to Minawao refugee camp seventy-five miles from the border. The sparring in the north between Cameroonian forces, now joined by Chadian troops, and Boko Haram is increasingly fierce. UNHCR reports as a result it is becoming harder to reach and transport to Minawao the thousands of refugees in the conflict zone.

These sorts of uncontrolled and unprotected refugee movements present knotty humanitarian and security problems. Displaced people will eventually settle wherever they can, often in unsuitable areas. Disease can sweep through densely-packed displaced populations who do not have access to adequate shelter, water, and medical care, and desperate people may fight over what few resources there are.

Nigeriens in the Diffa region, in an extraordinary display of hospitality in an area menaced by a food crisis, have been hosting thousands of Nigerians refugees. But many of the hosts are now displaced themselves and in need of the same assistance they were offering Nigerians a few days ago. As the local situation becomes more desperate and more refugees pour into the area and further strain scarce resources, there is danger that tensions with locals will blaze into violence, as it has in other countries.

And there will be more refugees. The Nigerian military has promised a major counteroffensive against Boko Haram, and Cameroon, Niger, and Chad have all committed troops to the cause. Boko Haram may have as many as 10,000 fighters to face off with the coalition; even if the counteroffensive is successful—and there is great reason to be skeptical it will be, given the Nigerian army’s frequently hapless performances against Boko Haram—it will be a long, violent campaign that will send many more Nigerians fleeing.

Boko Haram’s widening war has cut off thousands of displaced people from aid and exacerbated the region’s humanitarian and security crisis. Unfortunately, there will be little respite for refugees until northeastern Nigeria is peaceful—a distant prospect at the moment. Abuja has shown little inclination or capacity to undertake the military effort coordinated with civic and economic development in the north necessary to quell Boko Haram, which is why the international community must use every lever of influence it has to prod the Nigerian government to unreservedly commit to doing what it takes to defeat Boko Haram. Until that happens, the refugee crisis and suffering will continue.

Joshua Meservey was assistant director of the Atlantic Council’s Africa Center. Follow him on Twitter at @jmeservey.

The post What Boko Haram’s widening war means for refugees appeared first on Atlantic Council.

Stronger communication with Nigeriens before the President traveled to Paris might have helped them better understand that “We are all Charlie” was not endorsing caricatures of Islam, but was rather a repudiation of terrorism and an expression of support for freedom of speech.

Of course, there is no actual link between an irreverent French weekly and Nigerien churches—Pope Francis even condemned Charlie Hebdo’s depiction of Muhammad—yet protesters attacked the churches as symbols of Western religion and values. But the riots were also fueled by other difficulties afflicting Niger: regional insecurity, challenging demographic trends, and a lack of opportunities for its young people.

A Challenging Neighborhood

Niger, a landlocked country, has three neighbors—Mali, Nigeria, and Libya—that are facing profound insecurity, the spillover effects of which are affecting Nigerien society and national security.

AQIM in Mali
To Niger’s west, Mali is fighting al Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb (AQIM), which in 2012 captured swathes of the country’s north and was moving to grab more before a French intervention drove it back. Previously, in 2010, the group attacked the uranium mines at Arlit in northwestern Niger and kidnapped eight foreign workers; in 2011, the group broke into the capital Niamey and kidnapped two French tourists in a restaurant.

The Boko Haram Threat
To the south, Boko Haram’s progress in Nigeria is of deep concern. Cities recently attacked by the militants are close to the border between the two countries (Maiduguri and Baga are less than 150 miles from Niger), raising the possibility Boko Haram may stage incursions into Niger soon. The government has responded by mobilizing around 3,000 soldiers to guard the border.

According to Nigerien officials, approximately 90,000 refugees have fled Boko Haram violence into the Diffa region of eastern Niger, straining local communities that are facing a food crisis due to droughts and floods in 2012 and 2013; about 53 percent of the population in the Diffa region are food insecure while 23 percent are facing severe malnutrition. In December 2014, the government made an urgent appeal for international aid to tackle the humanitarian crisis brought on by the refugee influx.

Officials from Diffa also expressed concerns regarding unemployed youths leaving town to join Boko Haram for money. The group reportedly offers 300,000 West African CFA francs (approx. $580) to its recruits, which is an important amount in the region. Officials from the Diffa region urged the government to take measures to address youth unemployment and prevent a drain of youth to Boko Haram.

The End of the Qaddafi regime
In 2011, President Issoufou publicly objected to the international military campaign that unseated Libyan President Muammar Qaddafi, pointing out the risk of chaos in the region should Qaddafi fall. He was proved correct. The disintegration of the Qaddafi regime in 2011 saw around 200,000 Nigeriens return home, resulting in a drastic reduction in remittances from Libya and putting considerable financial pressure on communities and households already weakened by a drop in agricultural production.

As with the Nigerian conflict to Niger’s south, the Libyan situation has put regional security at risk, leading President Issoufou to call for international action to address the crisis. Niger has suffered directly from Qaddafi’s ouster: on May 23, 2013, groups linked to AQIM launched twin attacks on the northern cities of Arlit and Agadez, and President Issoufou accused the assailants of coming from southern Libya. More recently, on October 10, 2014, French soldiers participating in Operation Barkhane, a French-led multinational counterterrorism force that covers the Sahel region, destroyed a jihadist convoy crossing Niger from southern Libya to reach Mali and recovered three tons of weapons and ammunition.

France is assisting Niger by strengthening and equipping the Nigerien military fort in Madama, sixty-two miles from the Libyan border. The fort is the perfect location to control the Tummo and Salvador passes, the latter of which is a strategic crossing to the area where the borders of Libya, Niger, and Algeria converge and acts as a bottleneck for smugglers and jihadists transiting from Libya to Northern Mali.

Demographics and a Lack of Opportunity

 Fast-Growing Population
One watching the Charlie Hebdo protests in Niger would notice the fairly young age of the protesters, and for good reason; Niger has the lowest median age on the planet at 15.1 years (versus 46.1 for Japan and 37.6 for the United States), which means that almost half the population is below fifteen years old. Nineteen percent of the population is between fifteen and twenty-four.

Niger’s youth is a result of the highest fertility rate in the world—7.6 children per woman—that has led to a ballooning population. Between 1950 and 2015 Niger grew from two million citizens to around seventeen million, and is projected to reach about fifty-four million by 2050. Unless social programs (e.g., women’s education, vocational training) are strengthened, this high population growth will continue to be a drag on Niger’s development and poverty reduction efforts, something it can ill-afford as the country is ranked last in the United Nations Human Development Index.

Education and Employment
Despite improvements, the Nigerien education system lacks the capacity to educate all of Niger’s large youth population. The number of girls completing primary schooling in Niger increased from 36 percent in 2007 to 42.6 percent in 2011, but that still leaves more than half without access, while 40 percent of boys do not attend primary school.

Niger’s inadequate education system and high population growth makes it impossible for the country to create enough jobs for its youth; as a result, around 60 percent of Niger’s economic activity takes place in the informal sector. The formal sector, with the exception of some niche markets, is too disconnected from the global economy and limited in terms of opportunity for growth, and will not be able to provide the missing jobs.

The Government’s Response

All of these factors—regional insecurity and the increased strain on fragile communities it brings, the population boom, and low education and employment rates—contributed to the frustration that fueled January’s violence. The authorities are quite cognizant of the challenges. In 2012, President Issoufou launched the country’s poverty reduction strategy, the Plan for Economic and Social Development (PDES) for 2012-2015. This $10 billion strategy includes strengthening public institutions, enhancing the agricultural sector, and diversifying the economy. Out of the $10 billion, $8.3 billion is meant to be financed through external funds. Niger managed to secure donors’ pledges for about $4.8 billion which leaves a gap of about $3.5 billion to be filled.

Regional insecurity is another challenge to the PDES. Its increasingly precarious neighborhood compelled the Nigerien government in fall 2012 to add the Strategy for Development and Security (SDS) to the PDES to tackle the security issue. The SDS is a $2.5 billion plan for the northern desert areas, to which the government will contribute half the total cost.

President Issoufou has repeatedly called for substantial support to strengthen Niger’s capacity to tackle its security challenges and achieve its development objectives. The recent domestic unrest tells us that more attention should be paid to the country’s needs if we want to win the battle in the Sahel.

Abdoul Salam Bello is a senior fellow at the Africa Center.

The post Niger’s uprising: symptoms of Nigerien challenges appeared first on Atlantic Council.

The militants have resorted to using female suicide bombers as they ramp up their fight against the Nigerian government ahead of elections in February.

Bronwyn E. Bruton, deputy director of the Atlantic Council’s Africa Center, attributes Boko Haram’s rise to the Nigerian government’s failure to deliver good governance and the atrocities committed by Nigerian security forces.

The US should be looking for ways to engage Boko Haram, Bruton tells New Atlanticist’s Ashish Kumar Sen.

Q: Boko Haram is increasingly relying on female suicide bombers. Last week two female bombers killed dozens of people in Maiduguri in Nigeria’s Borno state. What’s the significance of this tactic?

A: What’s most significant about the use of female suicide bombers is that it proves Boko Haram is more than a local political rebellion: there is ideology at play here. There are no suicide bombers in African rebel movements. The deployment of suicide bombers is very foreign to African cultures and is something that is very specifically tied to the jihadi ideology and the jihadist movement.

When you started to see suicide bombers appearing in the Somali conflict, for example, it was understood to be a hard proof that transnational jihadis had come in and that there was foreign training and foreign money at play. I am concerned that this is proof of a parallel development taking place in Nigeria.

Q: Boko Haram’s leader Abubakar Shekau expressed support for Islamic State in Iraq and al-Sham [ISIS] leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi over the summer. Are you seeing a greater level of coordination between Boko Haram, ISIS, and al Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb [AQIM]?

A: There has been a lot of concern about the possibility of cooperation at some future point between Boko Haram and other jihadist movements like ISIS, AQIM, or even al Shabaab [in Somalia or Kenya]. There is no current collaboration at the operational level and Boko Haram is not currently regarded as any kind of threat to the United States homeland. But with developments like these, you might see that perspective on them starting to evolve.

Across Africa, people like Shekau are very good at understanding what makes the international community nervous. So you always have to wonder: to what extent are declarations of allegiance to ISIS or to al Qaeda just intended to make Washington sweat? I don’t know anyone who has supposed at this point that ISIS and Boko Haram are actually working together or even doing a significant amount of cross training or exchange of fighters, though there’s probably some chatter between them and an exchange of fighters may not be too far off. I would say it’s definitely an aspirational move on Shekau’s part.

One of the challenges that US counterterror analysts face is that movements like Boko Haram are big tents. You may have elements within Boko Haram that have every intention of becoming transnational terrorists and hurting the American homeland. But the majority of the movement is just local guys who are angry and upset and don’t have a better vehicle for their grievances. It’s a phenomenally difficult thing for people sitting on the outside, especially sitting in Washington, to start parsing those actors. The latest ceasefire declaration by the Nigerian government [on October 16] is a great example: the ceasefire was announced by one of the top military spokespeople and facilitated by the Chadian government, and it turned out the government’s interlocutor wasn’t even a legitimate representative of Boko Haram. [The Nigerian government] doesn’t even know who the movers and shakers are in this rebel group.

Q: How serious is the risk that Boko Haram could destabilize Nigeria’s neighbors, particularly Cameroon, Niger, and Chad?

A: This is the real and present threat that is posed by Boko Haram: that it will destabilize Nigeria and / or the neighboring countries. Boko Haram is growing in strength, holding and expanding its territory, and has a significant capability to inflict damage on communities on both sides of Nigeria’s porous borders. And the nations bordering Nigeria have varying capabilities to respond to Boko Haram.

Q: Boko Haram appears to be using the ISIS playbook as it attempts to carve out and hold territory in northern Nigeria.

A: This is very new. They have been attempting to hold and govern territory for less than a month now. They have issued calls for people to return to the territory and have promised that the people who come back will be safe. They have also promised that they are going to start governing and will try to deliver services, but I have not seen any evidence to indicate whether or not their efforts will be successful.

Q: The US has spent millions of dollars helping Nigeria fight terrorists, but US officials are also concerned that Nigerian security forces are feeding the insurgency by committing atrocities of their own. What should the US be doing to help Nigerian security forces given these concerns about human rights violations?

A: Frankly, I think the US should be finding ways to engage with Boko Haram. Boko Haram is horrifically violent — so are the Nigerian security forces — but it is attempting to serve as a voice for some of the grievances of northern Nigeria’s population. And some of Nigeria’s 70 million Muslims are embracing them. Maybe it is only for want of a better option, or because many people believe that the Nigerian government is even more brutal than Boko Haram, but the rebel group does actually have some support on the ground. And if a significant number of average people perceive Boko Haram as being on their side, and as a legitimate vehicle for expressing their political grievances, that means that you ignore them at your peril.

You have to find a way to bring the people who are participating in Boko Haram for legitimate reasons — because they feel angry at the Nigerian government or feel disenfranchised and want economic growth — into the political dialogue. If we take the standpoint that Boko Haram are terrorists and we are not going to talk to them, we are going to create enemies and push many more people into radicalism. We lost that fight for many years in Somalia. It’s not a nuanced position to take, and you need a nuanced position because the situation in northern Nigeria is enormously complicated.

If the United States government goes in with this position that just says: “These are the bad guys and the Nigerian government is the good guy and we’re supporting the Nigerian government” obviously that is going to fail.

The human rights abuses perpetrated by the Nigerian government are proof of that problem. According to various estimates, there have been about 12,000 people killed by Boko Haram since 2009. A conservative estimate is that about a third of them were killed by the Nigerian government. But we don’t know, it could be more. It could be half.

What’s indisputable is that if you go on the ground in northern Nigeria and ask people whom they hate more, it will be a coin toss whether they say Boko Haram or the government. That shows us that this is not a black and white conflict and that you really need to have a smarter approach. You just cannot afford to villainize anyone because everybody is a villain. There are no heroes here.

I would like to see the US government engaging with the governors and with the state-level governments. We have this kneejerk reaction to support the federal government, but if we engaged at the local government level at least we would be forced to confront the shades of grey, because a lot of the local officials have one foot in the federal camp and one foot in the Boko Haram camp.

If we just talk about throwing our support behind Abuja, a) they’re not a good partner and the human rights violations prove that, and b) we’re likely to make the situation worse. It’s going to be hard to operationalize our military support, and even if we do manage to get around the Leahy Amendment [which prohibits the US from providing weapons or other support to foreign forces that are credibly accused of human rights violations] and operationalize it we are likely to do more harm than good. We may be perceived as condoning or enabling the Nigerian security forces’ human rights abuses against Muslims, and that would be a terrible outcome for broader US security interests.

Q: How did Boko Haram emerge as this threat?

A: It is not properly understood that militia groups like Boko Haram are everyday actors in Nigerian life. Nigeria has a huge problem with security because there are not enough police — there are only 370,000 police in a country of 140 million — so youth militia have emerged as an alternate form of security, especially in Nigeria’s huge markets and in the north. These various militia have had a long history of being quasi-criminal enterprises, but also of working hand in glove with the government. In Boko Haram’s case, it was the brutality of the Nigerian security forces and specifically, the murder of Boko Haram’s leader [Mohammed Yusuf] in police custody in January 2009 — that pushed them onto this violent trajectory.

At a recent Atlantic Council event, Human Rights Watch expert Mausi Segun noted that up until mid-2012, Boko Haram was actually very firm in its commitment that it would not hurt women and children, and they didn’t. It was only, they say, the arrest and rape of their own families and children by the Nigerian security forces that caused them to take this tactic of kidnapping women, girls, and attacking schools as a kind of tit-for-tat retaliation.

What I want to stress here is that Boko Haram didn’t have some ideology that made it predetermined that they were going to become an international terrorist group. They have become a terrorist group because of the interplay with the Nigerian security forces, the government’s poor governance record, and massive abuses against the population and Boko Haram. This is really a failure of the Nigerian state. It is a homegrown problem.

The post Boko Haram Q & A appeared first on Atlantic Council.

While a concerted push by the Nigerian military managed to take back Mubi on November 13, the withdrawing Boko Haram fighters then swung northwest toward Chibok, from where they had kidnapped nearly 300 schoolgirls in April. In fact, the following day—seven months to the day after the students, 219 of whom are still missing, were kidnapped from the government Girls Secondary School—Boko Haram wrapped up its week by triumphantly hoisting its banner over its young victims’ hometown, a chillingly symbolic victory however fleeting (government forces retook the town on Sunday after mounting a major operation requiring the pulling of units from elsewhere).

Moreover, in its ongoing offensive, Boko Haram is not only using its well-honed terrorist tactics—last Monday, for example a suicide bomber killed 58 boys at a school assembly in Potiskum, Yobe State, while a week before that, another suicide bomber in the same town killed more than a dozen people attending a Shia religious procession marking Ashura—but also showing growing conventional military capabilities. In early September, the group shot down a Nigerian Air Force Dassault-Dornier Alpha attack jet—a feat that fighters of the so-called Islamic State in Iraq and Syria (ISIS) have not yet succeeded in doing—and subsequently, in a tip of the hat to the latter group’s grisly signature product, released a video that showed what it said was the beheading of the captured pilot.

Second, another video by Boko Haram, released through Agence France-Presse on November 10, showed, as analyst Jacob Zenn has pointed out, an increasing convergence between the Nigerian militants and their ISIS counterparts not only in terms of symbolism and ideology, but also insurgency doctrine. Boko Haram leader Abubakar Shekau first expressed “support” for the Islamic State’s caliph, Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, this past summer, but the pace of at least virtual exchange between the two groups represented by the leaders has quickened. Boko Haram has added the jihadist black banner (rayat al-uqab) to its previous crossed-guns-and-quran logo and the Islamic State’s de facto anthem, “My Umma, Dawn has Arrived,” to the musical repertoire on its videos. In the most recent video, Shekau even appears in a mosque to declare that he is establishing his own “Islamic Caliphate” and sends his greetings to the “brothers” in Afghanistan, Pakistan, Somalia, and Yemen, as well as to “the Caliphate in Iraq and Syria.” In case anyone misses the intended parallel of the messaging, the high-quality video cuts to a clip of al-Baghdadi proclaiming his caliphate in Mosul back in June.

Meanwhile, ISIS’s official magazine, Dabiq, has cited Boko Haram’s kidnapping of the Chibok schoolgirls as precedence for its enslavement and sexual abuse of Yazidi young women in Iraq, while Boko Haram has apparently taken a cue from ISIS as it has begun to stoke sectarian conflict between Muslims in Nigeria with its attacks on the small minority of adherents to Shia Islam. Both groups have abandoned hit-and-run guerrilla tactics in favor of seizing and holding increasingly large chunks of territory. As one of the most astute observers of the West African giant, former US Ambassador to Nigeria John Campbell recently noted, “Boko Haram’s focus appears now to be on the acquisition of territory…It also appears to be moving in the direction of providing services, especially security for the residents in the territories it controls.”   

Third, last week Nigeria’s ambassador to the United States, Adebowale Ibidapo Adefuye, delivered a blistering critique, subsequently posted on the embassy’s website, of what he characterized as the insufficient “scope, nature and content of the United States’ support for us in our struggle against terrorists,” specifically mentioning the failure to share intelligence and the refusal to sell weapons to the Nigerian government. Irrespective of what one makes of the diplomat’s charges and the possible explanations for what are perceived as slights—inter alia, that a contingent of US military personnel arrived in Abuja just two weeks after the Chibok kidnappings to advise the Nigerian military, that President Goodluck Jonathan himself has spoken of extremist penetration of the security services, and that more than one thousand Nigerian personnel have undergone Russian training in recent months, undoubtedly reason enough for American intelligence officials to be careful about what they passed along—the very fact that the remarks themselves were made so publicly is indicative of the tension coursing its way through Nigerian society, not only among the political elites and military personnel, but also felt by ordinary Nigerians. In less than four months, Africa’s most populous country will go to the polls with its electorate increasingly frustrated by the failure not just to win the release of the kidnapped schoolgirls (which is the cause célèbre the rest of the world seems to fixate on exclusively when it thinks about Nigeria at all), but to make any real progress towards resolving conflict that has, according to one well-regarded tracker, taken the lives of more than 17,000 people since the inauguration of the incumbent president’s current term (a ceasefire announced by senior Nigerian government officials in mid-October proved to be premature, to say the least).  

Consequently, whatever one thinks of Ambassador Adefuye personally or of his accusations substantively, his cri de cœur is one that can fairly be said to represent the sentiments of many of his fellow countrymen: “The terrorists threaten our corporate existence and territorial integrity. There is no use giving us the type of support that enables us to deliver light jabs to the terrorists when what we need to give them is the killer punch. A friend in need is a friend indeed.” It is a measure of general public desperation that sees the rise of vigilante groups like the Civilian Joint Task Force, profiled in the New York Times Magazine two weeks ago, as well as grotesque displays like the parading around this past Sunday of the severed head of the female suicide bomber who killed at least a dozen people in a market in Azare, Bauchi State, and the mob lynching of two men accused of accompanying her. And the anticipated drop in national revenue from declining oil prices led Nigeria’s coordinating minister for the economy and finance minister, Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala, to quite correctly announce over the weekend that a tightening of next year’s federal budget may be the responsible course of action—the cuts to all but essential obligations likely to result from such tightening will hardly improve the mood on the street.

While it is understandable that the United States and its major allies—faced with the ISIS threat in Iraq and Syria, the ongoing crisis in Ukraine, and the aggressive expansionism of China in East Asia, among other challenges—might not have much appetite for getting embroiled in another conflict in what appears to be a remote corner of Africa, this view is strategically and geopolitically myopic. Not only is Nigeria the most populous country in Africa, it is also the largest economy on a continent that is home to seven of the fastest growing economies in the world this decade. The rise of Boko Haram and other violent non-state actors not only threatens this progress, but should they not be checked, there is considerable risk of their rapid expansion given the overall weaknesses of states in the region—Mali is still struggling with restive Tuaregs and violence by militants linked to al-Qaeda’s regional affiliate in its north, Niger faces pressure from the ongoing disintegration of Libya, and Burkina Faso is still reeling from the vacuum following the ouster of its longtime president, just to cite three examples. In fact, there is already recent evidence that Boko Haram’s repeated incursions into Cameroon have turned the northern part of that country into a new front for the movement, which appears to have also established an operational branch in Chad among the Kanuri-speaking populations closely linked ethnically to its base in northeastern Nigeria.

Two months ago, I outlined the case why the United States, its African partners, and the rest of the international community need to focus more attention and resources—and, as I repeatedly stressed, the effort will require political, economic, and social instruments, not just military ones—on a situation that was already dire, but could quickly deteriorate even more significantly, arguing that ISIS is not be the only self-proclaimed caliphate against which a strategy has to be developed and a coalition assembled. After a week like the last one in Nigeria, major alarm bells ought to be ringing in capitals around the globe.

J. Peter Pham is director of the Atlantic Council’s Africa Center. You can follow the Africa Center on Twitter at @ACAfricaCenter.

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Alas, the carefully constructed compromise was not enough for some opposition politicians, who used social media to mobilize crowds to fill the burned out streets of the capital of Ouagadougou on Friday. Facing the prospect of even greater violence, Compaoré did right by his country and resigned the presidency. The military chief of staff, Major General Honoré Nabéré Traoré, has now declared himself the head of state.

The military takeover is in direct violation of article 43 of the Burkinabè constitution of 1991 and its subsequent amendments which specify that in the event the presidency falls vacant, the head of the National Assembly takes over the office, albeit with slightly limited powers. The acting head of state, who may not run for the top job, is then responsible for holding presidential elections between sixty and ninety days of the vacancy. The winner of that poll serves a full five-year term. Thus, the acting president should be Soungalo Apollinaire Ouattara, a scholarly 57-year-old administrator who is best known abroad in academic circles as the author of Gouvernance et libertés locales–Pour une renaissance de l’Afrique, a 2007 volume published by the respected French Africanist publisher Karthala on the interplay of democratization and decentralization and their role in governance in Africa.

Should the military’s play for power—based on the notion that parliament was dissolved on Thursday and, hence, there is no president of the legislature—be allowed to stand, the constitutional order that the demonstrators supposedly sought would certainly be betrayed by the results at the end of the day. On the other hand, if the new regime is viewed as having seized power, then all the consequences which I earlier laid out would come into play. In either case, the opportunity for the first-ever peaceful and democratic transition in the fifty-four-year history of Burkina Faso’s independence has been lost—and, regrettably, with it, undoubtedly, a great deal more.

J. Peter Pham is director of the Atlantic Council’s Africa Center.

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Deliberations, much less a parliamentary vote, never got underway. Protests, some involving unprecedented thousands of participants, have been taking place all week in the capital of Ouagadougou with the masses—some brandishing pictures of Compaoré’s murdered predecessor, the Marxist revolutionary Thomas Sankara, often dubbed “Africa’s Che Guevara”—chanting their opposition to any extension of the current president’s time in office. Tensions were so elevated that by Thursday, even Prime Minister Luc-Adolphe Tiao’s announcement that the amendment was being withdrawn was not enough to mollify the assembled mobs, which set about ransacking the offices of the national broadcaster and then burning down the city hall and several other public buildings, before finally looting and setting the main parliament chamber on fire. In the mayhem, at least three protesters were shot dead by security services.

Shortly thereafter, roving bands of youths began attacking the private residences of politicians, making little distinction—if they even knew or cared at all—between government supporters and opposition members, with even representatives opposed to Compaoré forced to flee for their lives. One opposition parliamentarian, Alassane Ouedrago, lamented to the Associated Press that “things are out of control because the demonstrators do not listen to anyone.” Outbreaks of violence also erupted elsewhere in Burkina Faso, including Bobo-Dioulasso, the country’s second-largest city, where numerous shops and other businesses were pillaged.

By Thursday evening, notwithstanding the proclamation of a national state of emergency by the president, the violence continued. Finally, the army chief of staff, Major General Honoré Nabéré Traoré, stepped forward with a decree dissolving both the National Assembly and the government, imposing a curfew, and promising the formation of an inclusive government to organize elections in twelve months’ time. After several hours of confusion about whether the president would have a role in this transition or even whether he was still in the country—wild rumors flashed repeatedly across social media and news stories described a “coup”—Blaise Compaoré appeared to give an address on national television to confirm the dissolution of the government, announce the lifting of the state of siege, and reported that he would open discussions with the political opposition and civil society. The president also announced that at the end of the transition period, which he would lead, he would “transfer power to a democratically elected president.”

Despite the calls for calm, there were still some protests on Friday as demonstrators called for the president’s immediate ouster. If they and the opposition politicians who used social media to urge more mass protests prevail, then there will be consequences, many of which those foreign governments whose statements—like the one put out on Tuesday by US State Department spokesperson Jen Psaki—focused more on limiting Compaoré’s tenure than what might follow in his wake, have not really begun to contemplate.

First, for all of his faults and the unfortunate associations of his early years in power (including with the likes of Libya’s Muammar Gaddafi and Liberia’s Charles Taylor, which I chronicled more than a decade ago in my books on the civil wars in Liberia and Sierra Leone), Blaise Compaoré had matured into something of an elder statesman of West Africa, delivering solid progress at home and contributing significantly to regional security and peacemaking (even hosting a major hub for US surveillance of activities by al-Qaeda’s regional affiliate as well as the French forces leading an anti-terrorism effort across the Sahel), as I detailed just three months ago. In his remarks at an Atlantic Council-hosted event at the margins of the US-Africa Leaders Summit in August, Compaoré renewed his support for a robust security partnership with the United States and its allies. Now, just as Mali continues to battle Islamist militants, Niger faces pressure from the continuing disintegration of Libya, and Nigeria reels from Boko Haram’s continued onslaughts, Burkina Faso, a linchpin of regional security, teeters at the brink. And, of course, the extralegal removal of a head of state before his term expires would result in the country’s suspension from the African Union and the Economic Community of West African States (a communiqué from ECOWAS explicitly warned that the regional body would “not recognize any ascension to power through non-constitutional means”) as well as the cut-off of military cooperation by the United States and other countries—effectively putting the country beyond the pale of the international community until constitutional order is restored.

Second, mob rule is the form of government least likely to achieve positive internal political outcomes for any country. While it is one thing to demonstrate against a proposal to allow the incumbent to extend his tenure beyond the previously existent limits—and, in fact, the African Union Charter on Democracy and Good Governance has stipulations against the practice—it is another thing to drive him or her from office before the end of his or her term without even a nod to constitutional norms. By what right does a frenzied mob of looters (or a cabal of uniformed officers) claim to “represent” millions of other people?

Third, were Compaoré driven out before his current term ends, not only would Burkina Faso’s international partners likely suspend non-humanitarian assistance (and dash any hopes of a second edition of Burkina Faso’s highly-praised $480 million Millennium Challenge Compact), but investors who have slowly, but steadily, trickled into the country during the long years of stability provided by Compaoré will likely flee—or at least the ones who can will (mining companies that have made the country Africa’s fourth-largest gold producer would have to try to weather the storm, but forget about any new projects). It is hard enough to attract business to a landlocked African country at the edge of the desert without YouTube clips of riotous mobs running amok through government and commercial edifices. It will take considerable effort for Burkina Faso to recover from the damage which the violent demonstrations of the last week and the overthrow of the country’s government have wreaked on its reputation. The unemployed urban youth who spearheaded many of this week’s attacks are, tragically enough, going to be among the first to suffer from any decline of an already difficult economic landscape.

Fourth, a politically- and militarily-isolated Burkina Faso facing further economic marginalization would not only be unable serve as the geopolitical anchor of the Sahel region, but would also itself quickly become vulnerable to the very terrorist and criminal networks that it had so long helped to combat. Instead, a Burkina Faso that is prostrate could open a pathway for militants and criminals in the Sahel to penetrate southward to more economically buoyant countries like Ghana and Côte d’Ivoire.

There is a proverb frequently quoted among the Burkinabè that says he who burns down a house soon learns why ashes cost a fortune. Alas, if Burkina Faso descends into chaos, it will not only be the mobs that literally set Ouagadougou on fire this week that would soon be finding out the price of bitter ashes, but likely an entire swathe of Africa.

J. Peter Pham is director of the Atlantic Council’s Africa Center.

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More alarmingly, except for a fleeting moment earlier this year when the brutal kidnapping of nearly three hundred schoolgirls and the ensuing social-media campaign focused the spotlight on the Nigerian marauders, the burgeoning threat is receiving little of the attention it deserves and even less of the resources necessary to combat it.

Several years ago, in a National Defense University-published study, I warned that the formerly obscure group had not only survived a ham-fisted attempt to suppress it, but was actually expanding both its reach and the scope of its operations, thanks in part to assistance from foreign terrorist organizations, including some linked with al-Qaeda. As a result of these links, against the conventional view at the time, I saw a significant shift in Boko Haram’s message and its capabilities, forecasting that, if left unchecked, it would metastasize into a much more lethal threat, both to Nigeria and its neighbors and to the wider international community.

Three months ago, in testimony before the US Congress, I surveyed the extent to which that threat had actually evolved over time, arguing that if the foreign links were a critical part of Boko Haram’s ideological and operational shift from “version 1.0” to the far more lethal “version 2.0,” the takeover of northern Mali by various Islamist militant groups aligned with al-Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb (AQIM) in 2012 provided a whole new set of opportunities, leading to what I have termed “version 3.0.” Specifically, I noted that, during the time AQIM and its allies held sway over northern Mali, Boko Haram was able to set up a number of bases in the territory where hundreds of its recruits received ideological instruction, weapons and other training that subsequently raised the tactical sophistication and operational tempo of its attacks in Nigeria, elevating the group to the level of a full-fledged insurgency.

Following the French-led intervention in Mali in early 2013, the Nigerian militants, possibly accompanied by a few foreign nationals, returned to northern Nigeria not only with training and some combat experience in desert warfare, but also vehicles and heavy weapons, including shoulder-fired missiles. Within weeks, Boko Haram fighters were raiding military barracks for even more weapons, staging increasingly bold prison breaks, destroying numerous schools, hospitals, and other government buildings, engaging the Nigerian military in pitched open battles, and, in some cases, totally overrunning border towns. By the middle of 2013, the militants had effectively evicted Nigerian government troops and officials from at least ten local government areas in northeastern Borno State along the borders of Niger, Chad, and Cameroon and set themselves up as the de facto authority in the region, replacing Nigerian flags with their own banner, taxing and otherwise ordering citizens about, and creating a large area, roughly the size of the state of Maryland, within which they could operate with even greater impunity, including launching the infamous raid in April that resulted in the kidnapping of the schoolgirls from Chibok.

Thus “Version 3.0” of Boko Haram is distinguished from previous phases by the group’s ability to seize and hold territory—much like what al-Shabaab has done for years in Somalia, AQIM did in Mali in 2012, and ISIS is doing in Iraq and Syria today—and the militants have been doing so at an alarming rate. Up until recently, the area controlled by Boko Haram was remote and sparsely populated, but that has been changing.

On August 6, fighters from Boko Haram captured the town of Gwoza, on Nigeria’s border with Cameroon. On August 25, after having destroyed a month earlier the bridge on the road linking the town to the Borno State capital of Maiduguri some 120 kilometers to the southwest, the group attacked and destroyed army barracks in the town of Ngala, just south of Lake Chad, and then proceeded to take the town of Gamboru, a few kilometers away. The seizure of the twin towns gave Boko Haram control of a local government area with a population of roughly a quarter of a million people. A week later, on September 1, Boko Haram fighters swung clockwise to overrun their biggest prize yet, Bama, a city with a population of nearly 300,000 just 60 km southeast of Maiduguri.

While, at least for the moment, it seems unlikely that Boko Haram has the wherewithal to try to seize Maiduguri, an urban sprawl with more than a million inhabitants plus countless others who have fled there as outlying areas fell to the militants, territory they now hold does form a pincer around the city and, undoubtedly, they will launch probing attacks that will add to the misery of those now caught inside. Meanwhile, Boko Haram has gone on the offensive beyond long-suffering Borno State to take over towns and local government areas in neighboring states. Following an assault that began at the end of July, Boko Haram gained control of Buni Yadi, the headquarters of the Gubja local government area in Yobe State to the west of Borno, on August 21. On September 6, the government of Adamawa State to the south of Borno confirmed that the insurgents had entered the town of Gulak and overrun the surrounding Madagali local government area; Reuters correspondents spoke with witnesses who told of militants going house to house shooting people. The following day, after a failed military attempt to retake the captured area, thousands of panicked residents from nearby towns were reported to have fled their homes and begun trickling into the state capital of Yola. On September 8, Abuja’s Leadership newspaper reported that Boko Haram forces had chased the military from Michika, the headquarters of the most populous local government area in Adamawa, and foisted the group’s black flag over the town.

Meanwhile, over the weekend, a Nigerian defense official announced airstrikes against the insurgents occupying their recent conquests, but it is not immediately clear whether the sorties had the intended effect, much less their impact on the unfortunate civilian population caught in the targeted towns.

Where it has taken control, Boko Haram, like its ISIS counterpart in the Levant, has raised its black flag over public buildings and brutalized those who failed to adhere to its extremist Islamist strictures. In Yobe State, according to AFP reports cited by Al Jazeera, two people caught smoking cigarettes were summarily executed late last month. In Borno State, the spokesman for the Roman Catholic Diocese of Maiduguri, Father Gideon Obasogie, told journalists last weekend that the insurgents were beheading men who refused to convert to Islam and forcing their widows to convert and marry militants. According to a tally by Open Doors, a Netherlands-based non-denominational international organization that advocates for Christian victims of religious persecution, more than 178 churches had been destroyed by Boko Haram as of the end of August. Muslims who do not share Boko Haram’s extremist ideology have also been targeted: Gamboru Ngala residents recounted that the Islamists executed the area’s most senior Muslim cleric after overrunning the district last week, while at the end of May the Emir of Gwoza, Shehu Mustapha Idrissa Timta, was killed by Boko Haram a few weeks after he gave a speech denouncing the group’s violence (two other traditional rulers, Abdullahi Ibn Muhammadu Askirama, Emir of Askira, and Ali Ibn Ismaila Mamza II, Emir of Uba, barely escaped the ambush).

And it is not just Nigerians who are suffering from the predations of the militants. In late May, Boko Haram fighters ambushed a Nigerien patrol in the region of Diffa, north of Borno. At the end of July, the wife of Cameroon’s Deputy Prime Minister Amadou Ali and a local traditional chief were kidnapped by the group from Kolafata, in the far northern part of the country.

Despite the largest defense budget in Africa, commensurate with their position as the most populous country and largest economy on the continent, Nigerians have very little to show for it. It is bad enough that none of the Israeli-made Aerostar drones Nigeria purchased a few years ago, reportedly for almost a quarter of a billion dollars, had been maintained and were inoperative when needed in the search for the kidnapped girls this spring, but the country’s security forces are so ineffective that Boko Haram has managed to steal their vehicles literally from underneath Nigerian soldiers: according to eyewitness accounts reported in the Nigerian press, during last week’s assault on Bama, the militants deployed over a dozen armored vehicles they had taken from the military when they captured Gwoza last month. And the troops that are supposed to oppose the militants are so demoralized that, more often than not, they flee without putting up much, if any, fight. Despite efforts by Nigerian defense officials in the federal capital of Abuja to try to explain the presence of a full battalion of their soldiers in neighboring Cameroon as a “tactical maneuver,” it is hard to credit that spin when the unarmed unit was returned en masse by the Cameroonians at the border town of Mubi, Adamawa State, miles south of the fighting in Borno. The Nigerian press reported that the members of the battalion claimed to have joined civilians in flight after running out of ammunition. Late last week, according to a Voice of America report, Cameroonian officials took in another 400 Nigerian soldiers who handed over their weapons at the border town of Amchide and sought refuge from the fighting.

One has more sympathy with the nearly 10,000 Nigerian refugees whom the United Nations says have fled for sanctuary in Cameroon over the last two weeks as well as the more than 2,000 who have taken refuge in Niger, joining the 50,000 who have fled to that poor country since last year.

Perhaps even more troubling than the humanitarian challenge posed by the refugees as well as the hundreds of thousands of internally-displaced persons is the growing ambitions of Boko Haram’s emir, Abubakar Shekau, who proclaimed a “caliphate” in northern Nigeria in an hour-long video released on August 24: “Thanks be to Allah who gave victory to our brethren in Gwoza and made it part of the Islamic caliphate… We did not do it on our own. Allah used us to captured Gwoza; Allah is going to use Islam to rule Gwoza, Nigeria and the whole world. ” In reporting the rambling message, Al-Jazeera noted that while the Boko Haram chief had previously voiced support for ISIS leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, there was no indication in the new video that the former was still associating himself with the latter and “as such, it was not clear if Shekau was declaring himself to be a part of Baghdadi’s call or if he was referring to a separate Nigerian caliphate.”

Speaking in Nigeria last week at the opening of the US-Nigeria Binational Commission’s Regional Security Working Group, Assistant Secretary of State for African Affairs Linda Thomas-Greenfield was characteristically straightforward about recent developments: “Boko Haram has shown that it can operate not only in the northeast but elsewhere in the country. We are very troubled by the apparent capture of Bama and the prospects for an attack on and in Maiduguri which would impose a tremendous toll on the civilian population. This is a sober reality check for all of us. We are past time for denial and pride.” She announced that, as part of the Security Governance Initiative announced by President Barack Obama during last month’s US-Africa Leaders Summit to facilitate comprehensive security sector governance and accountability mechanisms, the United States was planning to launch a “major” border security program for Nigeria and its neighbors.

While this is a very welcome start, the United States, its African partners, and the rest of the international community will need to focus more attention and resources—and, as I have repeatedly stressed, the effort will require political, economic, and social instruments, not just military ones—on a situation that is already pretty dire, but could deteriorate significantly very rapidly. Otherwise, ISIS won’t be the only Islamic State against which a strategy will have to be developed and a coalition assembled.

J. Peter Pham is director of the Atlantic Council’s Africa Center.

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