"Poor funding stalls Africa's initiatives"

By Sifelani Tsiko, www.herald.co.zw

AFRICAN countries must strive to mobilise their own resources to augment their home-grown strategies to bring peace and stability to the continent's many troubled spots, political analysts say.

"Funding is still a major problem for the African Union's peacekeeping force," says Prof Heneri Dzinotyiwei, a University of Zimbabwe political analyst.

"This is a big problem. The AU itself has not generated enough revenue."

A number of initiatives are currently underway to end conflicts raging on this vast continent, but lack of money is scuttling efforts to end conflicts in Africa.

Money for the Peace and Security Council peacekeeping force has been sourced from the European Union, raising questions about independence and conditionalities.

"It needs African countries to take the matter seriously and ensure that we build the AU as a leading institution which is beneficial to all parts of Africa," says Prof Dzinotyiwei.

The EU provided US$300 million to the PSC for conflict prevention, raising worries about the African Union's readiness to meet the cost of bringing peace and stability on the continent.

African leaders met in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia, last week to discuss security issues and other matters related to the development needs of the 53-member grouping.

Wars raging on in Sudan's western Darfur region, in the Great Lakes region and Cote d'Ivoire, political analysts say, demand that African leaders think seriously about the PSC's long-term goals and back "their fine words with money".

They argue that external funding, with all the conditionalities surrounding it, gives powerful countries in the West an excuse to meddle in the affairs of the continent.

"Africa must demonstrate its political will to free the AU Peace and Security Council from the crushing external dependence," says Alpha Oumar Konare, the chairman of the AU executive commission, in obvious reference to the EU's support.

Funding apart, political analysts say the composition of the peacekeeping force also provides another challenge in the acceptability of such a force in an armed conflict.

Prof Dzinotyiwei says it is critical to ensure that the PSC peacekeeping force is not dominated by one country alone to avoid assembling a force that would not be acceptable to one or another of the warring factions.

"What is vital is to defuse perceptions that the peacekeeping force is dominated by one country," he says. "The force itself should be seen strictly within the context of the AU itself."

This, he says, would improve the extent to which the force finds acceptance in conflict zones.

"A peacekeeping force should be there strictly for nothing but peace," he says.

According to military analysts, Africa has experienced a total of 186 coups and 26 major wars in the last four decades, something which the current crop of African leaders do not want to see recurring.

But on the flip side, the costs of peacekeeping are astronomical. Recent estimates suggest that the AU would need no less than US$600 million a year to implement its PSC ventures.

This is a major headache for African leaders who, on the one hand, speak eloquently about the need to reduce donor dependency in sensitive areas such as security but, on the other, are found wanting when it comes to footing the bill for peacekeeping initiatives.

Critics still cannot see the day Africa will go it alone and throw away the begging bowl.

"I cannot see a situation where our governments can fight unjust wars without going to donors or the IMF/World Bank, but cannot find the resources when it comes to building a peaceful and united Africa," says Ugandan-based Tajudeen Abdul Raheem.

Conflicts that require urgent attention include crises in Darfur, the Democratic Republic of Congo and Cote d'Ivoire.

The AU Peace and Security arm lacks the means and resources to deploy a peacekeeping mission in Darfur, where an armed conflict has killed more than 30 000 people, displaced millions of people in this trouble spot in which the UN says is the world's worst humanitarian crisis.

Plans are afoot to send a 300-strong armed protection force to the Darfur region and, already, Nigeria, Rwanda, Tanzania and Botswana have been approached to provide troops to this initiative.

"We are confident (Sudan) will accept. It has been difficult but we are talking," Sam Ibok, AU Peace and Security director was quoted as saying.

UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan and US Secretary of State Colin Powell went to Darfur recently to pile pressure on warring sides to end the war.

There is a strong determination by African leaders to avert a repeat of killings of the magnitude witnessed in the 1994 Rwandan genocide in which Hutu extremists killed 800 000 minority Tutsis and Hutu moderates.

Despite the major handicaps related to lack of resources, the means and other logistical issues, notable achievements have been recorded in ending a number of conflicts on the continent.

In the DRC a fragile peace is still holding, thanks to timely intervention by Southern African Development Community countries including Zimbabwe.

Meanwhile, peace efforts in the Indian Ocean Comoros Islands and a breakthrough in the Kenyan-brokered peace talks between the Sudanese government and southern rebels and peace holding on a thin thread in the simmering border row between Ethiopia and Eritrea all give the continent reasonable hope for peace.

Initiatives also exist to entrench peace in Cote d'Ivoire, the Central African Republic, Somalia and other troubled spots in West Africa.

Prof Dzinotyiwei says African countries must demonstrate commitment and respect for AU protocols so as not to undermine the continent's achievements made so far.

"We can only improve it (AU) by ensuring that decisions adopted at AU level are upheld by all member countries," he says. "This is very vital, otherwise we remain a playing ground and undermine the position of the AU.

"The ball really is in the hands of the African leaders."

He says Africa must unite in order to put an end to perceptions that it is continent that identifies itself in terms of sub-regions.

Prof Dzinotyiwei expressed concern at the tendency among some countries in Arab Africa to be identified more with the Middle East, Europe and Asia instead of the communities that they share the same soil with.

"This kind of thought ought to disappear from our minds," he says.

"Our leaders need to adopt converging positions on policy matters than maintain unnecessarily extreme nationalistic views that do not have Africa as a whole at heart."

Analysts say leaders must remember that the first rule of law is economics.

They say if there is no collective will to pay for the PSC programmes, their noble ideas will come to nought, throwing the AU into the trap of its predecessor, the OAU, which was criticised heavily for being ineffective.

The continent's dream of peace and stability will be shattered. Africa's leaders must be bold enough to put their money where their mouths are.

That is the only way to lift the AU and ensure that it plays a leading role in peacekeeping initiatives on the continent.

Reproduced from: www.herald.co.zw