Explaining Foreign Policy in Post-Colonial Africa 3030629295, 9783030629298

Citation preview

Explaining Foreign Policy in Post-Colonial Africa Stephen M. Magu

Explaining Foreign Policy in Post-Colonial Africa

Stephen M. Magu

Explaining Foreign Policy in Post-Colonial Africa

Stephen M. Magu Political Science & History Norfolk State University Norfolk, VA, USA

ISBN 978-3-030-62929-8 ISBN 978-3-030-62930-4 (eBook) https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-62930-4 © The Editor(s) (if applicable) and The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2021 This work is subject to copyright. All rights are solely and exclusively licensed by the Publisher, whether the whole or part of the material is concerned, specifically the rights of translation, reprinting, reuse of illustrations, recitation, broadcasting, reproduction on microfilms or in any other physical way, and transmission or information storage and retrieval, electronic adaptation, computer software, or by similar or dissimilar methodology now known or hereafter developed. The use of general descriptive names, registered names, trademarks, service marks, etc. in this publication does not imply, even in the absence of a specific statement, that such names are exempt from the relevant protective laws and regulations and therefore free for general use. The publisher, the authors and the editors are safe to assume that the advice and information in this book are believed to be true and accurate at the date of publication. Neither the publisher nor the authors or the editors give a warranty, expressed or implied, with respect to the material contained herein or for any errors or omissions that may have been made. The publisher remains neutral with regard to jurisdictional claims in published maps and institutional affiliations. Cover illustration: © Alex Linch shutterstock.com This Palgrave Macmillan imprint is published by the registered company Springer Nature Switzerland AG The registered company address is: Gewerbestrasse 11, 6330 Cham, Switzerland

Re-dedicated to the brightest star in the constellation, Mary Wanjiku Macharia-Magu, all her children all their/her/my children, for anchoring these turbulent times and sharing the joys of life and work. And to Dr. Akomolafe & departmental colleagues, for taking a chance on future possibilities; To other really special people Tina Thomas (and Andros), Jade Nicquole, the Bellos and Rose. To Ashia Danielle and zeitgeist conversations about the world and spirituality before pandemics. To Lessie, for excellence in everything. To Joy. For friendship, mentoring and ‘my siblings’. To the next generation of leaders and activists I had the pleasure of teaching: to my many students who needed stuff to read Alesha, Alexis, Alicia, Aniyah, Breauna, Deja and thousands more. And to a continent figuring out its future in a most convoluted, post-colonial, post-Cold War, post-pandemic world.

Preface

This book’s contours were triggered by a NCSU workshop on CivilMilitary Relationships in Africa, and Just War theory in pre-colonial African societies. Even while they fought, societies sustained enough diplomatic interactions to facilitate negotiations—peace terms, surrender terms, conduct during war, treatment of prisoners, post-conflict settlement and even payment of tributes. The study prepared argued that Just War (theory) existed in African societies just as it did elsewhere. The question was one of systematicity: how did (pre) modern nations agree on parameters of the conduct of conflict? Conventions, e.g., dropping a blade of grass indicated surrender; some only fought men, not women and children. Even more prescient, the Numidian (Algeria/Tunisian) Bishop (or Saint) Augustine of Hippo articulated some of the earliest formalized tenets of Just War, which were also used in many other African countries. This was an element of diplomacy. Despite few written accounts of their history, the Ag˜ık˜ uy˜ u people, similar to other African societies, conducted the complete spectrum of government and foreign policy. They made war and sued for peace; they traded, conducted diplomacy and entered into alliances. Their history, conquests and setbacks were kept alive through stories, plays, proverbs, age-sets traditions, theatrical, musical and dances, wise sayings and all other manner of education, gave insight into war conduct. They forged alliances, declared wars, negotiated cease-fires, made peace treaties, sent emissaries, received diplomats, and conducted cross-societal marriages in

vii

viii

PREFACE

service of peace and diplomacy and alliances, much as Europe did. Some of these were directed at the world-famous Maasai, Akamba, Meru, etc.; diplomacy was alive and well. Back to St. Augustine: who else in Africa fought (mostly everybody), how did they fight (variably: some killed all enemy warriors, women, kids, boys, men; some killed everyone except marriage-age women, some saved all women, children and the elderly). Together, these constituted (just) war conduct. Proceeding thence, it was useful to consider what we knew, didn’t know, and didn’t know we didn’t know. There is much we don’t know about pre-colonial African societies; yet we know that these units were not mere ‘tribes,’ incapable of ‘government.’ Contrariwise, ‘tribes’ collected taxes, enumerated citizenry, recruited and trained armies, had judicial systems with appropriate punishments and judges (elders) selected for wisdom and knowledge of precedent. They had executive organs (council of elders), built infrastructure (roads, earthen works, cities, drainage systems, outposts, irrigation systems, defense positions, grain storage), traded (barter trade, long distance—i.e., exports and imports), maintained social systems, and issued currency, e.g., cowrie shells, gold, bronze and salt. They made known their practices to others and used reciprocity (Maasai and Kikuyus would cease fighting when one side dropped their spears). In short, diplomacy in the contemporary African nation is not a post-colonial reality. Today, many African countries do not scream, “I am not a regular, modern, Westphalian, bureaucratic state.” Instead, Africa is more…different. Bits and bytes have been expended trying to figure out how, and why. Perhaps some explanations might stem from the fact that African states experienced their first instance of centralized, bureaucratic, Westphalian statehood during a decidedly violent colonial occupation. It was solely predicated on a preponderance of violence (no rights, no privileges or immunities, just violence, murder, arson and taxes). Further, random lines drawn on a map, disregarding the precolonial experience, purported to concoct a modern, European version of the Westphalian state—producing Somalia’s irredentism and an oddly shaped DRC map (southern tip). The residents—not yet citizens—were now supposed to get along and bury their perceived differences. The Maasai of Kenya/Tanzania, their nomadic lifestyle and habitat shared with wildlife, show little regard for borders or passports. Whatever utility such states served, they magnified division and conflict, fostering the need for diplomacy all around.

PREFACE

ix

Granted, this is quite the quantum leap, to imply that since pre-colonial African societies utilized diplomacy, modern African nations have foreign policy positions and further, that there is an African foreign policy position. These probabilities lend themselves to other avenues of analysis. The question of what common foreign positions were adopted by African nations either in Pan-African solidarity or as individual nations are worthy scholarly endeavors. More specifically, African colonial nations, administered either as part of the French Empire or as no-status territories by other European powers, would soon become free, join a universe of biand multilateral diplomacy, former colonizers casting shadows over their future, but also fighting to liberate especially the southern African colonies and territories still under apartheid. It was inevitable, that the joint preferences for Africa’s complete liberation intersected but that collective action had a better chance of forcing a greater reckoning with colonialism. This was the beginning of elements of a common African foreign policy, the subject of this treatise. Norfolk, USA

Stephen M. Magu

Acknowledgments

Completing this manuscript, which was under research and preparation in the years preceding the most consequential issue of our time, the 100-year, COVID-19 pandemic, was taxing. Despite the disruptions, the steep learning curve and the circumstances that required us to learn and adapt to the new ‘language’ of social-distancing, PPE, masks, Zoom, BB Collaborate, a/synchronous teaching and learning and reminded us of the beauty (and peril) of in-person human interactions, some of the amazing people around me deserve a mention. I am grateful to NCSU’s SPIA for the invite to the Civil-Military Relationships in Africa workshop that helped shape these ideas. I recognize the SERSAS/SEAN conferences, which have become a place of camaraderie, friendship, collegial collaborations and scholarly critiques to make research and knowledge a most productive undertaking. I am indebted to the Tuskegee Colleagues, especially Dr. Ndi, for your research and career insights and faith in the continent. I am grateful to colleagues, especially Joy, Mamie, Mike, Mohammed and Robert for…everything. I am grateful to Maureen (MEL), for embodying the very best of us and for the amazing things you will do. My eternal gratitude to Catherine (CLP) for insight, collegiality, critique, academic road trips with stops in some of the most interesting places in these United States, and for conference flights to random cities and random stops to other conferences and everything you did—and amazing pictures of Grover.

xi

Contents

1

2

3

4

5

6

7

The Beginning of a Post-colonial Foreign Policy in Africa

1

Conceptual Approaches to Foreign Policy and Application to African Countries

19

Politics of Geography, Statehood, Residual Colonization and Territorial Integrity

61

Africa Huru! Complex Events—Cold War, Residual Colonization and Apartheid

99

Nation vs. Continent: Sovereignty, Territorial Integrity and Rebellion

153

Made in Europe: Breaking Nations, Secession Movements and OAU Responses

193

Region or Continent: O/AU Development and Regional Economic Communities

231

xiii

xiv

8

9

CONTENTS

Between BRICs’ Promise and Past Western Trauma: Whither, Africa?

265

Africa’s Post-Colonial Foreign Policy: Assessing History, Imagining the Future

299

Index

339

Abbreviations

ACHPR ACP ADB AMISOM APRM AU BRIC CIS COMESA EAC II EACSO EALA ECOMOG ECOWAS FLS FOCAC GATT GDP GNU HIPC IAFS ICC ICPSD ICRC ICTR

African Commission on Human and Peoples’ Rights African, Caribbean and Pacific countries African Development Bank African Union Mission to Somalia African Union’s African Peer Review Mechanism African Union (2002–present; OAU was Its Predecessor) Rising/Major Global Powers—Brazil, Russia, India and China Confederation of Independent States Common Market for Eastern and South Africa East African Community II (EAC I: 1967–1977) East African Common Services Organization East African Legislative Assembly Economic Community of West African States Monitoring Group Economic Community of West African States Front Line States Forum on China-Africa Cooperation General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade Gross Domestic Product Government of National Unity—(Post-election peace in Kenya, Zimbabwe) Highly Indebted Poor Countries India–Africa Forum Summit International Criminal Court International Convention for the Pacific Settlements of Disputes International Committee of the Red Cross International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda xv

xvi

ABBREVIATIONS

IGAD LDCs MDGS MENA MONUSCO NAM NEPAD OAU PSC R2P RECs SADC SADR SSA UN UNECA UNEP UNGA UNSC UPU WTO

Inter-Governmental Authority on Development (formerly D—Drought) Least Developed Countries Millennium Development Goals, Sunset 2015 Middle East & North Africa United Nations Organization Stabilization Mission-Dem. Rep. of the Congo Non-Aligned Movement New Partnership for Africa’s Development Organization of African Unity (1963—2002) African Union’s Peace and Security Council Responsibility to Protect Regional Economic Communities Southern African Development Community Sahrawi Arab Democratic Republic (or Western Sahara) Sub-Saharan Africa United Nations Organization United Nations Economic Commission for Africa United Nations Environmental Program United Nations General Assembly United Nations Security Council Universal Postal Union World Trade Organization

CHAPTER 1

The Beginning of a Post-colonial Foreign Policy in Africa

This chapter sets the scene for the formation of states in Africa, as a result of independence, beginning late in the 1950s, particularly in the sub-Saharan region. As World War II concluded and a new world order emerged, pitting the US-led, democratic capitalist western world against the USSR-led communist-socialist world, European countries, war ravaged and desperately holding onto increasingly assertive and soon-tobe independent colonies in Asia and Africa, found themselves increasingly on the periphery of global order debates, but also provided ammunition to the USSR and its allies, given continuing colonialism. Pressure also came from within the colonies in the form of independence movements, from the more receptive Soviet orbit, from the US itself given the pointed contradictions, from regional organizations, such as the Arab League and afield, Asian countries and their collective action (e.g., the Bandung Conference and the Non-Aligned Movement), and the liberated African countries such as Ghana and former French West Africa. The chapter outlines the most important issues addressed in the monograph— read foreign policy—that would confront the countries, individually, and together, as they struggled to rid the continent of the yoke of colonialism especially in the southern African region. A book—any book—that purports to articulate an African foreign policy evokes intellectual disquiet, even suspicion. Africa is territorially massive, covering 11.7 million mi2 , 20% of Earth’s land area and has © The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2021 S. M. Magu, Explaining Foreign Policy in Post-Colonial Africa, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-62930-4_1

1

2

S. M. MAGU

(54+) countries (Western Sahara), a 1.3 billion persons or 16.64% of earth’s population and its fastest growing as of 2019. North-South, and East-West, it covers almost 5000. 2600 different languages are spoken, with likely the same number of ethnic, social, linguistically, historically, religiously, culturally and economically disparate groups. Even their colonial experiences were different. As diverse and different as the nations are, there is a diversity of viewpoints of and positions on issues such as foreign policy. It is useful to articulate a working definition of foreign policy. Foreign policy is about a country and its government enunciating interests that translate into its interaction strategies with other countries, organizations, MNCs and other ‘actors’ who can influence its actions, reactions, decisions and outcomes. Thus, of necessity, defining foreign policy should include the range of actors, often acknowledged to be countries with articulated preferences and interest(s), strategies that involve unilateral, bilateral and multilateral negotiations, coercion, concession or a mix thereof, entailing actions aimed toward at least one or more actor external to the country or actors, a decision, and a means of communicating preferences and outcomes. Formally, foreign policy is “the strategy or approach chosen by the national government to achieve its goals in its relations with external entities. This includes decisions to do nothing.”1 Most IR scholarship holds that states are the primary actors in international relations, that they all have, and articulate their preferences, that these preferences are mostly unchanging from one to the other (i.e., states are functionally similar). States signal these preferences to other states and actors and to their own publics. It is useful to consider where these interests arise from, despite the proposition that states are unitary actors. Without delving into domestic audiences and sources of legal authority in states, often, leaders pursue policies harmful to their states in their name. Some territorially expansive states have different population and interest groups that vary the interests, but even in smaller states such as Rwanda, such interests can vary. Even in unitary, homogeneous states (e.g., Somalia), these interests vary and often pull the fabric of states’ centrality apart.

1 Valerie M. Hudson, “The History and Evolution of Foreign Policy Analysis.” In Steve Smith, Amelia Hadfield and Timothy Dunne, Eds., Foreign Policy: Theories, Actors, Cases (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2016), 14.

1

THE BEGINNING OF A POST-COLONIAL FOREIGN …

3

These differences are aptly captured by Benedict Anderson, writing that “an American will never meet, or even know, the names of more than a handful of his [300] million-odd fellow-Americans. He has no idea what they are up to at any one time. But he has complete confidence in their steady, anonymous, simultaneous activity.”2 There are shared commonalities binding them within the polity—a national anthem, president, senate or federal structures—and other interests such as foreign wars, trade and immigration, upon which a nation builds some form of consensus. If even countries disagree on their interests, a foreign policy for Africa is less defensible. This is not just due to its size (~3.5X the US), but due to its diversity that also has common features, e.g., colonial experiences, liberation outcomes, post-colonial paths and current interests. There is a further distinction between sub-Saharan Africa (SSA) and the North African region (Maghreb/Sahel), culturally, religiously, demographically and historically. An argument on the more fortuitous proposition of examining Africa’s most critical states’ foreign policy, and their influence on the continent’s major issues is plausible. Several states come to mind: South Africa (even with its tortured history), Egypt (the Arab world’s cultural and religious center), Nigeria (most populous African country with the highest GDP), or Equatorial Guinea, the wealthiest country in Africa (GDP p.c. of US$ 34,865). Ethiopia was not colonized but endured several years of Italian occupation after 1935, and Liberia, the American Colonization Society’s creation as a destination for newly-freed African slaves, or Mauritius, consistently ranked highest in measures of democracy in Africa, or perhaps D. R. Congo, with its perennial conflicts, or the failed Somalia, decidedly merit scholarly inquiry. Given the earlier recognition of a perceived common destiny and colonial experience, a continental approach is more useful. Even those countries not listed have unique history, characteristics and circumstances with merit. Yet as most theorists might posit, these are not major powers, and therefore, their actions are less consequential to the broader interstate interactions. Rather than wade into interstate, regional and continental contests over whom, when and why, and potentially risk another interstate war, this research approaches the question of Africa’s foreign policy from an “issues” perspective. It focuses on issues that have 2 Benedict R. O. G. Anderson, Imagined Communities: Reflections on the Origin and Spread of Nationalism (New York: Verso, 1991), 26.

4

S. M. MAGU

been especially important to Africa and required collective action. Even after resolving the selection criteria—issues versus states—a subsequent challenge presents: What issues are, have been most important, and how should they be studied, even organized? African states, entering a largely structured and stratified world order, had less influence than especially European and Asian states. But they faced issues unique to, or reflecting their own experience: apartheid and Ian Smith’s UDI in Rhodesia are good examples. But even with a most egregious issue such as apartheid, where one might expect an African consensus on the evil apartheid portended, some countries defected from consensus. Should the Organization of African Unity (OAU), African Union’s (AU) predecessor, take a hard-line position (favored by most countries) and support armed struggle? Could the OAU negotiate with the apartheid South African leadership to find inclusion for the disenfranchised majority, as a minority of countries argued? In advocating for collective action, did intervention necessarily rise to the level of interference in the internal affairs of a sovereign nation, which African countries were unequivocally opposed to? Decolonization fervor challenged the extent to which countries were willing to go. Even as its diplomats used every occasion at the UN to demand decolonization, Frontline States (FLS) such as Tanzania actively hosted, and Libya trained freedom fighters, violating sovereignty and noninterference in the affairs of sovereign nations, at the behest of the OAU. Still, new challenges arose around colonial borders and the dispersal of language groups that led to irredentism, as in Somalia. How would countries deal with borders, irredentism and the conflict it entailed? What—if there would be one—would the African position on the Cold War and the East/West divide be? Was this even important for Africa? What countries considered extremely important varied, even though most of Africa’s new countries seldom articulated their foreign policy. Many African countries were now independent, sovereign nations, free, and able to pursue their own interests and craft foreign policy. The pursuit of these interests brought them into close proximity with each other, and with issues that often affected the countries the same way— trade, development, neo/colonialism, regional and the ~ phone residual relations (Francophone, Anglophone, Lusophone and other), defense agreements, etc. The individual countries’ positions often differed from the continental position on foreign policy issues, and countries regularly violated the continent-wide tenets of independence, of sovereignty and

1

THE BEGINNING OF A POST-COLONIAL FOREIGN …

5

non-interference in the domestic issues of other countries even when genocides were occurring. Tanzania, for example, cheerfully and successfully intervened in Uganda in 1978–1979, ousting Amin; granted, Amin’s expansionist ambitions brought upon him the Armageddon of an invasion by the all-around, usually mild-mannered Tanzania’s wrath.

Defining Africa’s Important Issues A cursory Google web search of the term ‘key issues + African Union’ produces the usual suspects: a list of three, seven, top or ten issues perceived to be Africa’s most important. Some are as perennial and predictable as sunrise (conflict, poverty, hunger), while others are newer (state failure, terrorism, war and hegemony). For AU’s 2017 Heads of States and Governments summit, Gaffey identified three ‘key issues’ (i) the status of Western Sahara in light of Morocco’s stated desire to rejoin the African Union in 2017 and subsequent re-admission; (ii) preventing genocide in South Sudan (Africa’s newest country promptly degenerated into ethnic conflict after nearly 40 years of conflict and OAU/AU peace activities); and (iii) leadership changes and election of the AU Commission Chair, where Chad’s Moussa Faki succeeded Nkosazana Dlamini-Zuma. In the Crisis Group’s briefing No. 135 of January 2018, seven major issues confronting the AU are discussed. They include the need for the AU to identify a strategic direction through consensus-building on institutional and financial reform, contain disruptions occasioned by Morocco/Sahrawi Arab Democratic Republic (AU Member State, recognized by 85 countries around the world, with diplomatic representation in 40 of them); elections in the DRC (postponed to two years beyond the deadline and the almost inevitable rejection of the results); facilitating deployment of election observers to 17 countries holding elections in 2018; stemming conflict in and implementing peace (based on the AU roadmap) in the Central African Republic; continuing to support Somalia and not withdrawing AU troops (deployed through AMISOM); and stabilize South Sudan, independent in 2011, and which has experienced conflict since 2014.3

3 The Crisis Group, “Seven Priorities for the African Union in 2018.” Briefing No. 135/Africa, 17 January 2018.

6

S. M. MAGU

The AU has sought to address the most critical issues, yet, despite the OAU having existed for almost 40 years, it had remained largely ineffective. Part of the reason is the inclusive, rather than exclusive nature of membership. Could African states and the OAU have found more success by predicating membership on the European Union (EU)-like Acquis Communautaire? The AU has in some instances shown grit, including deploying troops to Somalia, later transforming into an UN-supported peacekeeping mission, AMISOM. There are issues where the AU collaborates on much better as a continental body (on decisions binding to the members states)—e.g., broadly supporting boycotts and embargoes directed at the apartheid South African government. Thus, this is a more profitable route to take, in assessing how African countries have made their decisions on the most important issues, especially those affecting member states. Most issues affecting African countries can generally be classified as domestic policy, or foreign policy issues. A robust IR debate addresses the influence domestic politics has on foreign policy and vice versa. This link is the subject of Putnam’s 1988 Diplomacy and Domestic Politics: The Logic of Two-Level Games. In analyzing the 1978 Bonn summit outcomes, Putnam postulates that “neither a purely domestic nor a purely international analysis could account for this episode. Interpretations cast in terms either of domestic causes and international effects (‘Second Image’) or of international causes and domestic effects (‘Second Image Reversed’) would represent merely a ‘partial equilibrium.’”4 Putnam argues for a more ‘general equilibrium,’ linkage and simultaneity in the influence of domestic issues and preferences on global politics and vice versa. Africa is special—or not: it is not immune to this logic of two-level games a la Putnam. Diplomacy does not guarantee that consensus will be reached,5 although per de Senarelens, “the conventional divide between domestic politics and international relations has become obsolete as the former,

4 Robert D. Putnam, “Diplomacy and Domestic Politics: The Logic of Two-Level Games.” International Organization, Vol. 42, No. 3 (Summer, 1988): 430. 5 For additional discussions on two-level games, strategy and bargaining, and the interplay between domestic and international politics, see, among others, Kahler (1993), Moravcsik (1993), Milner and Tingley (2015), James Rosenau (2003) (with a substantive discussion on distant proximities - greater globalization and localization of global vignettes), and de Senarelens (2016).

1

THE BEGINNING OF A POST-COLONIAL FOREIGN …

7

while largely determined by the latter, can in turn affect regional and world security and wellbeing.”6 During the earliest independence years, Africa faced the urgent question of what to do with newly-inherited national borders. Should nations keep them, or should the OAU consider new boundaries? Leading pan-Africanist leaders such as Nyerere, Kenyatta, Nkrumah and Banda and others acknowledged the urgency of the issue, in conference, they kept the borders. Not even a year later, the borders led to regional conflicts: Kenya and Somalia, 1964–67, Ethiopia and Somalia, Ethiopia and Eritrea (Eritrea becoming independent in 1993) and Nigeria and Cameroon, over the Bakassi Peninsula. States’ borders, crafted without regard for ethnic composition, resulted in splitting of territories occupied by Somalis (between Ethiopia, Somalia and Kenya), the Maasai (Kenya and Tanzania), among others. In large part, this division and subsequent decisions assured that Rwanda, Kenya/Somalia, Ethiopia/Somalia, Somalia/Djibouti would persist long after. The Critical Issues Appreciating Africa’s complexity, the breadth of its issues, its rich history, current opportunities and challenges, and future strategies, an assessment of its foreign policy from independence to the present is warranted. Its pre-colonial period does not lend itself to continental analysis; there were states, kingdoms and empires, but these were scattered and seldom undertook coordinated actions. Some African states’ foreign policy decisions and strategies, formulated after 1950, have been informed by preand colonial issues, foreign pacts, geography, spheres of influence, trade, territorial interests and foreign powers domination of global power relations. After they liberated themselves, they could formulate own foreign and domestic policy strategies, although structures and foreign policy were often sprinkled with European flavor. They soon became Cold War trapeze artists: they were courted by the eastern and western blocs, while most former colonies were choosing non-alignment. Thus, though

6 Pierre de Senarelens, “Psychoanalysis and the Study of Emotions in International Politics.” In Yohan Ariffin, Jean-Marc Coicaud, Vesselin Popovski, Eds., Emotions in International Politics: Beyond Mainstream International Relations (New York: Cambridge University Press, 2016), 171.

8

S. M. MAGU

they were often de jure non-aligned, former European colonial powers influenced them in/directly and the east/west wooed them. Independence confronted myriad African issues, the most pertinent of which are discussed here. Criteria for consideration are these: issues that affected Africa or parts thereof, had global implications, or led to intervention individual states, groups and external actors (e.g., UN, NATO, OECD, EU). Some are addressed more generally as they affected countries in different ways but were always present. An example is the Washington Consensus conditionalities relating to reforms to allow access to loans. The changes not just donor-driven: domestic pressure, political activism and broader global changes such as the fall of communism gave oxygen to African political reforms. Other ‘mandated reforms’ were geared toward economics and were thus replicated in Regional Economic Communities and the African Economic Community but also as a precondition for foreign aid. Reforms included free trade, removing non-tariff barriers, free markets, better governance and political freedom among others. African countries detested the preconditions but global power structure changes assured that the only loan sharks they could borrow from, made the rules, and there really was no viable alternative. Africa’s foreign policy issues can be analyzed through myriad lenses and even theoretical approaches. This study applies three broad lenses. First, colonization of African societies, which forced them to transition from sub-state, homogeneous, pre-colonial societies into the legally ill-defined colonial ‘entities,’ subjected to foreign rule through fraudulent treaties and brute force. Their freedom came after 1950, and their introduction into a global order was in the context of an ongoing global Cold War. The second lens was the immediate post-Cold War period: here, the issues centered on a new global order. Inextricably interlinked issues included state-failure and the rise of (violent) non-state actors, who often utilized the dire levels of human development and poverty to recruit into militia and terrorist groups focused especially on western interests. The capitalistdemocratic western alliance-imposed aid preconditions, including trade liberalization, free markets, good governance and expansion of political space. The third lens reflects more recent global trends: whereas the capitalist-democratic front has persisted, challengers emerging from postcolonial states such as China, Brazil and India. Increasingly, they have offered an alternative to the western-dominated global apparatus, and suggest a model that African countries can follow.

1

THE BEGINNING OF A POST-COLONIAL FOREIGN …

9

Suffice to say, these three lenses cannot cover the entirety or complexity of Africa’s past, present and future issues. Africa did not have or stake common positions out of the gate, but their experiences and unwavering determination to end minority rule in South Africa and Rhodesia and other residual colonialism created shared interests and thus natural alli(anc)es. OAU’s founding was vital, and its constituent nations launched efforts to untangle the complex mess of future states the Europeans left. Africa’s institutes found themselves trying to undo the damage done by the colonial administrators, including balkanization and splitting homogenous groups, and divide-and-rule that sowed seeds of an inevitable future conflict. African states held diametrically inconsistent positions: if colonial governments were not legitimate and did not represent Africans’ aspirations, were they obligated to honor treaties and agreements colonists acceded to? Conversely, they kept the colonial borders, thus recognizing decisions by authorities they considered illegitimate. The desire for self-governance was so strong that African nations upheld these agreements that were often detrimental to their own historical practices and interests. One such example, thorny then and now, was agreements governing the Nile waters; it heavily favored Egypt, and prohibited upstream countries from damming the river. The Nile’s origin is Lake Victoria, fed by rivers in Kenya, Tanzania, and Uganda. Three pre-independence agreements were the culprits: a 1902 treaty between Great Britain and Ethiopia; H. E. “Menilik II, King of Kings of Ethiopia, engages himself towards the Government of His Britannic Majesty not to construct or allow to be constructed any work across the Blue Nile, Lake Tana, or the Sobat.”7 The 1929 Anglo-Egyptian treaty (often referred to as ‘exchange of notes’) stated that: “save with the previous agreement of the Egyptian Government, no irrigation or power works or measures are to be constructed or taken on the River Nile and its branches, or on the lakes from which it flows […] which would in such a manner as to entail any prejudice to the interests of Egypt, either reduce the quantity of water arriving in Egypt, or modify the date of its arrival, or lower its level.”8 7 Joseph Awange and Obiero Ong’ang’a, Lake Victoria: Ecology, Resources, Environment (Berlin: Springer, 2006), 287. 8 Mwangi Kimenyi and John Mukum Mbaku, Governing the Nile River Basin: The Search for a New Legal Regime (Washington, DC: Brookings Institution Press, 2015), 37.

10

S. M. MAGU

The third was the 1959 bilateral agreement between Egypt and Sudan; it reinforced the 1929 Anglo-Egyptian treaty’s provisions, and increased water usage allocations for both Sudan and Egypt.9 The April 1955 Bandung Conference brought together nations newly independent and proposed to form an alternative to the east/west blocs. It was the first Afro-Asian conference that articulated countries’ desire to pursue a non-alignment policy.10 Six African countries—Egypt, Ethiopia, (then) Gold Coast, Liberia, Libya and Sudan—sent delegations. Countries attending the conference represented a “combined population [that] made up approximately two-thirds of the world’s people.”11 During the conference, Nehru’s support for African countries’ independence was a notable rallying point. Eventually, the Non-Aligned Movement was founded at the Belgrade Conference in 1961, with the agreement that the members “had to pursue an independent foreign policy, peaceful coexistence, and abstain from joining cold war military alliances.”12 African countries’ non-alignment policy was severely tested, yet they had little trouble reconciling sovereignty with active support of anticolonial movements and ultimate independence of other African ‘countries’ and territories still subjected to foreign control.13 The actual practice of non-alignment was mostly unsuccessful: newly independent countries remained beholden to former colonial powers. Frequently, bilateral relations with former colonial powers overshadowed those established with neighbors. Still, the principle of non-alignment became a central pillar of African countries’ relations with the rest of the world.

9 Kimenyi and Mbaku, Governing the Nile River Basin, 2015. 10 C. M. Turnbull, “Regionalism and Nationalism.” In Nicholas Tarling, Ed., The

Cambridge History of Southeast Asia: Volume 2, The Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1992). 11 Luis Eslava, Michael Fakhri and Vasuki Nesiah, “Introduction: The Spirit of Bandung.” In Luis Eslava, Michael Fakhri and Vasuki Nesiah, Eds., Bandung, Global History, and International Law: Critical Pasts and Pending Futures (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2017), 4. 12 Marco Wyss, Jussi M. Hanhimäki, Sandra Bott and Janick Maria Schaufelbuehl, “Introduction: A Tightrope Walk—Neutrality and Neutralism in the Cold War.” In Sandra Bott, Jussi M. Hanhimaki, Janick Schaufelbuehl and Marco Wyss, Eds., Neutrality and Neutralism in the Global Cold War: Between or Within the Blocs? (New York: Routledge, 2016), 4. 13 Wyss, et al., “Introduction: A Tightrope Walk,” 2016.

1

THE BEGINNING OF A POST-COLONIAL FOREIGN …

11

Parallel to the founding of the Non-Aligned Movement (NAM) in 1961, then-sovereign African countries were engaged in deciding the character of future African unity. Three major schools of thought presented (as groups): Brazzaville Group, Monrovia Group and Casablanca Group. The Brazzaville Group was populated by Francophone states that favored continental integration based on economic cooperation and closer ties with their overlord, France. The Casablanca Group envisioned African unity as a federal government structure, akin to that of the US. This approach intimated a political and economic union of African countries. The Monrovia Group was numerically superior to the other two. It favored a looser continental association, but emphasized that state sovereignty was sacrosanct.14 This ultimately informed the Organization of African Unity’s structure. As nations contended with OAU’s structure and found challenge in regionalism advocated by Nyerere, Senghor and Houphouet-Boigny, old and new regional organizations formed. They were infused with historical basis, regional and economic integration and services and political aspirations. The organizations were not all new: in 1967, the first East African Community (EAC I) was formed. It replaced the East African Common Services Organization (EACSO). Further back in 1917, Kenya and Uganda had a customs union (Tanzania joined later). The customs union was succeeded by an abortive East African High Commission in 1947.15 In French-controlled Equatorial and West African region, L’Afrique-Équatoriale française (French Equatorial Africa), comprising of the Central African Republic, Chad, Gabon and Congo was reflected this trend. It had regional federal structures (currency, trade, transport) that fostered regional integration but also assured French control in the event of independence. The French vision came to pass: in 1959 countries founded the Union douanière équatoriale (Equatorial Customs Union).16 A major issue in Africa’s foreign policy is the persistent manifestation of the spectrum of political violence. It ranges from interstate wars 14 Kimenyi and Mbaku, Governing the Nile River Basin, 2007. 15 Hector Carcel, Luis A. Gil-Alana and Godfrey Madigu, “Currency Union in the

East African Community: A Fractional Integration Approach.” In Almas Heshmati, Ed., Economic Integration, Currency Union, and Sustainable and Inclusive Growth in East Africa (Cham: Springer International Publishing, 2016), 42; and The Republic of Kenya, “The Kenya Gazette,” Vol. LXVII-No. 43 (Nairobi: GP, 21 September 1965), n.p. 16 Aghrout, “Africa’s Experiences with Regional Co-Operation and Integration,” 1992.

12

S. M. MAGU

(e.g., Kenya vs. Somalia, Ethiopia vs. Somalia, Libya vs. Egypt, Algeria vs. Western Sahara, Djibouti vs. Eritrea (a border conflict), Uganda vs. Tanzania’s vita vya Kagera, among others. Intrastate wars (civil wars), low-intensity conflicts and coups d’états account for the near 40% of global conflicts attributed to Africa. Interspersed with these are international, and African-led peace overtures, peacekeeping missions, military interventions the world is happy happen (e.g., Tanzania-Ugandan war, or the ECOWAS near-intervention in The Gambia after Yahya Jammeh’s refusal to concede defeat in elections), and ongoing attempts to activate a Peace and Security Council of the African Union. Some conflicts have attracted international dispute resolution mechanisms and UN-sponsored prosecution of war criminals. They include the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda (ICTR),17 the UN Special Court for Sierra Leone (and Residual Special Court for Sierra Leone).18 The adoption of the Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court (ICC, or, International Criminal Court Statute) in July 1998, and its entry into force in July 2002 ushered in a new era for Africa and the world. War crimes would be more systematically addressed. Notwithstanding, majority of its prosecutions and arrest warrants issued have led to the ICC being accused of bias, a “court for Africans” even as its mechanism addresses conduct during conflict. Another major issue touching on Africa’s foreign policy is human rights. Africa’s record here is less than stellar, perhaps predictably so, given that their first instance of statehood of diverse previously conflictual groups was the colonial state. The very nature of the independent state born out of colonialism with its egregious treatment of African subjects, and the broader global geopolitical realities of the Cold War meant that states could get away with human rights violations with impunity. After all, the colonial state was built on a foundation of oppression and in the US, civil rights were only now producing positive outcomes, denying the major powers any standing to advocate for human rights. Push-back 17 The full title of the court is: The International Criminal Tribunal for the Prosecution of Persons Responsible for Genocide and Other Serious Violations of International Humanitarian Law Committed in the Territory of Rwanda and Rwandan Citizens Responsible for Genocide and Other Such Violations Committed in the Territory of Neighbouring States between 1 January and 31 December 1994. 18 United Nations Dag Hammarskjöld Library. “UN Documentation: International Law.” UN Documentation: International Law. https://research.un.org/en/docs/law/ courts.

1

THE BEGINNING OF A POST-COLONIAL FOREIGN …

13

might drive countries into the Sino-soviet camp, and that was decidedly the least optimum outcome. An unintended consequence of this reality was that African leaders had little impetus to level the playing field or address the grievances informed by ethnic schisms exacerbated by colonialism. Most quickly abandoned any pretense of multiparty democracy. But the extent to which governments could run amok was changing: The Rome Statute recast sovereignty as states’ responsibility to protect, with the implied possibility of external intervention. Cold War realities that enabled countries’ bad behavior could lead to intervention. Intriguingly, 30 African countries have ratified the Rome Statute, none have unsigned. As distasteful as the now-diluted concept of sovereignty is, governments have reluctantly conceded that their new raison d’être is protecting their citizens, and if they don’t, international collective responsibility to intervene may occur. Responsibility to Protect (R2P) has been applied successfully in Africa, including during Kenya’s post-2007 election. R2P was used to address Libyan government’s response to the 2011 Arab Spring protests. Even in Darfur, former Sudanese president al-Bashir found himself scrambling out of countries that might arrest him and hand him over to the ICC on the basis of suspected war crimes in Darfur. Africa has also increasingly sought to pursue pacific settlement of disputes. It has also responded with moves to encourage greater accountability for leaders using NEPAD’s Africa Peer Review Mechanism (APRM) that evaluates governance, and the fiscally-attractive Mo Ibrahim Foundation’s Ibrahim Prize for Achievement in African Leadership with a US$5 million award. Other mechanisms include data and reports issuing from the World Bank Group’s Worldwide Governance Indicators and Transparency International’s Corruption Perceptions Index (CPI) indicators. Economic development has been, predictably, most salient to African countries. As they became independent, it was clear that colonial neglect, despite arguments to the contrary, rapid development and elimination of poverty, disease and illiteracy were urgent. For almost three-quarters of a century, colonial powers bestowed upon Africa the worst HDI indicators. Tanzania had few paved roads, DRC had one doctor for the whole country and 16 doctoral students. Despite escaping colonization, half of Ethiopia’s high school teachers in 1962 were Peace Corps Volunteers. Funding human and economic development for countries dependent on, and net exporters to the west was challenging, in addition to colonial obligations they inherited. Despite strong advocacy for independent financial

14

S. M. MAGU

institutions such as a UN bank, they found little success and had to subject themselves to the Bretton Woods institutions conditions for loans, or accept aid from donors, funding that came with strings attached. Spurred by the west, trade liberalization was afoot, led by technocratic institutions such as GATT. Development theory suggests that Africa and other Global South countries were unable to compete with developed countries that had only recently colonized them. Africa was unsuccessful in driving favorable trade conditions, agreements and exemptions. The western prescription for economic growth entailed “reforms” including the Structural Adjustment Program (SAPs) and Washington Consensus. The result was, unsurprisingly, a steep decline, a decrease, elimination and under-investment in basic services and introduction of user fees for countries with meager per capita GDP. Predictably, social services, health and educational sectors suffered and reversed most of the progress countries had made. Other issues that inform African countries’ foreign policy include regional economic communities (RECs). Some are holdovers from colonial institutions, while others issued from the post-colonial Brazzaville, Casablanca and Monrovia groups. Many applied the EU model to precolonial institutions and aspired to integrate on the basis of shared economic conditions, to pool resources and expand markets. Over time, some developed military and security cooperation: ECOWAS organized ECOMOG while IGAD, even absent a standing military apparatus, undertook the IGADSOM mission and more loosely, EAC member states deployed troops to Somalia. Overall, economic development is a priority for African countries. This is warranted: their development indices show exceptionally high unemployment rates, an ever-growing “youth bulge” where 60% of Africa’s population is below 30. The growing importance of technology as a fourth factor of production is tied to economic development. Africa has notched some wins such as M-Pesa (mobile money platform) and Ushahidi crowdsourcing software. Applying technology to the challenges of economic development can increase the pace of development.19 Collective actions implied in Africa’s foreign policy line up with trends among the world’s major economies and regions. Africa is courted, for better or worse, by these established and by rising powers for its resources

19 UNICEF, “Levels & Trends in Child Mortality Report, 2018.” New York, 2018.

1

THE BEGINNING OF A POST-COLONIAL FOREIGN …

15

and manpower. BRICs and the UE are partners with the AU, and have supported African solutions to the continent’s challenges. Its institutions have repurposed their role and expanded its structures and issues. It is leading in mitigating conflict, viz. the AMISOM mission. Outside of effects and implications of Sars-Cov-2 (COVID-19), institutions, e.g., Africa’s CDC and newly-fangled AfCFTA with a 1.4 billion market, hold promise, compliment RECs, AEC and a future political federation, perhaps fulfilling Agenda 2063, a century past colonialism. Research Monograph Outline A foreign policy for Africa remains imprecise. There are 54 sovereign nations, a few non-self-governing countries, European enclaves, disparate issues, interests and geography. Synthesizing each country’s foreign policy is attractive; still, it is undeniable that continental issues might best be addressed through the O/AU lenses. Since some of the major issues— trade, sovereignty, conflict—attract global involvement and countries’ issues sometimes overlap or appear related, an O/AU lens is prudent as are the Cold War and post-Cold War periods.20 As a collection of independent nations, the immediate post-independence period was obtruded into a Cold War landscape, with proxy wars often fought in Africa. Tellingly, convergence of interests with unusual, self-interested allies such as the USSR, which supported the liberation movements to spite and/or challenge the US and its allies, the Cold War had an outsize impact on Africa. Other proxy battlefields included wars, such as the Ogaden War of 1977–78, Angola, Namibia and the Congo. The post-Cold War period, beginning with the fall of the Berlin Wall and ultimately, the disintegration of the Soviet Union in 1991, led to countries and the OAU scrambling to conform with a new, less forgiving world order. The straw-man was no more, and the new hegemon, the US, intended of remaking the world in its image. Unable to play the US against any other country and with only one option, African countries danced to the tune of western global capitalism and democracy. Africa failure to secure independent global development institutions and 20 Other scholars have studied Africa’s foreign policy, from antiquity to present (Nanjira 2010), individual countries (Mandela 1993: South Africa’s future foreign policy); and foreign policy of the Congo and South Africa (Jackson 1984), but the number of such studies is woefully small.

16

S. M. MAGU

financing basis was now leveraged against them, and there was great nostalgia in such institutions as the UN’s Special Fund (SUNFED). Despite glaring inequalities and dependency of African nations, free trade and market liberalization was a thing. Would African nations adapt to the new boss’ whims or meet a most Jurassic Park end? Besides identifying the major events that have occurred in Africa since the 1950s, the book addresses theoretical explanations of Africa’s foreign policy-making processes and whether they comport to processes elsewhere; the politics of geography, new statehood, residual impacts and implications of colonization as well as territorial integrity, the complexity and impact of the Cold War on Africa’s most important issues (liberation for all) and responses to apartheid. It considers nationalism, national unity, dispersal of homogeneous populations across state borders and the challenges it procures, such as separatism, secession, rebellion and state contestation. It highlights the parallels of Regional Economic Communities (RECs) and a repurposed AU, BRICs, their foreign policy preferences and the new ‘race’ for engagement with Africa, seeking to frame new directions and relationships away from a capitalist-democratic world order. Lastly, an inflection, a blueprint of Africa’s future foreign policy is considered.

References Aghrout, Ahmed. “Africa’s Experiences with Regional Co-Operation and Integration: Assessing some Groupings.” Africa: Rivista Trimestrale Di Studi e Documentazione Dell’Istituto Italiano per l’Africa e l’Oriente, vol. 47, no. 4 (1992): 563–586. www.jstor.org/stable/40760734. Anderson, Benedict. Imagined Communities: Reflections on the Origin and Spread of Nationalism. New York: Verso, 1991. Awange, Joseph and Obiero Ong’ang’a. Lake Victoria: Ecology, Resources, Environment. Berlin: Springer, 2006. Carcel, Hector, Luis A. Gil-Alana and Godfrey Madigu. “Currency Union in the East African Community: A Fractional Integration Approach.” In Economic Integration, Currency Union, and Sustainable and Inclusive Growth in East Africa. Edited by Almas Heshmati. Cham: Springer, 2016. The Crisis Group. “Seven Priorities for the African Union in 2018.” The Crisis Group. Briefing No. 135/Africa (January 2018). https://www.crisisgroup. org/africa/b135-seven-priorities-african-union-2018#. Eslava, Luis, Michael Fakhri and Vasuki Nesiah. “Introduction: The Spirit of Bandung.” In Bandung, Global History, and International Law: Critical Pasts

1

THE BEGINNING OF A POST-COLONIAL FOREIGN …

17

and Pending Futures. Edited by Luis Eslava, Michael Fakhri, Vasuki Nesiah. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2017. Jackson, Henry F. From the Congo to Soweto: U. S. Foreign Policy Toward Africa Since 1960. New York: William Morrow & Co., 1984. Kahler, Miles. “Bargaining with the IMF: Two-Level Strategies and Developing Countries.” In Double-Edged Diplomacy: International Bargaining and Domestic Politics. Edited by Peter B. Evans, Harold K. Jacobson and Robert D Putnam. Berkeley: UC Press, 1993. Kimenyi, Mwangi and John Mukum Mbaku. Governing the Nile River Basin: The Search for a New Legal Regime. Washington, DC: Brookings, 2015. Makinda, Samuel M. and F. Wafula Okumu. The African Union: Challenges of Globalization, Security, and Governance. New York: Routledge, 2007. Mandela, Nelson. “South Africa’s Future Foreign Policy.” Foreign Affairs, vol. 72, no. 5 (1993): 86–97. https://doi.org/10.2307/20045816. Milner, Helen V. and Dustin Tingley. Sailing the Water’s Edge: The Domestic Politics of American Foreign Policy. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 2015. Moravcsik, Andrew. “Introduction: Integrating International and Domestic Theories of International Bargaining.” In Double-Edged Diplomacy: International Bargaining and Domestic Politics. Edited by Peter B. Evans, Harold K. Jacobson and Robert D. Putnam. Berkeley: UC Press, 1993. Nanjira, Daniel Don. African Foreign Policy and Diplomacy from Antiquity to the 21st Century, Volume 1. Santa Barbara: Praeger, 2010. Putnam, Robert D. “Diplomacy and Domestic Politics: The Logic of TwoLevel Games.” International Organization, vol. 42, no. 3 (1988): 427–460 https://www.jstor.org/stable/2706785. Republic of Kenya. “The Kenya Gazette.” Vol. LXVII-No. 43. Nairobi, 21 September 1965. Rosenau, James N. Distant Proximities: Dynamics Beyond Globalization. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 2003. de Senarelens, Pierre. “Psychoanalysis and the Study of Emotions in International Politics.” In Emotions in International Politics: Beyond Mainstream International Relations. Edited by Yohan Ariffin, Jean-Marc Coicaud and Vesselin Popovski. New York: Cambridge, 2016. Turnbull, C. M. “Regionalism and Nationalism.” In The Cambridge History of Southeast Asia: Volume 2, The Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries. Edited by Nicholas Tarling. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1992. UNICEF. “Levels & Trends in Child Mortality Report, 2018.” https://data.uni cef.org/wp-content/uploads/2018/10/Child-Mortality-Report-2018.pdf. United Nations’ Dag Hammarskjöld Library. “UN Documentation: International Law.” UN Documentation: International Law. https://research.un.org/en/ docs/law/courts.

18

S. M. MAGU

Wyss, Marco, Jussi M. Hanhimäki, Sandra Bott and Janick Maria Schaufelbuehl. “Introduction: A Tightrope Walk—Neutrality and Neutralism in the Cold War.” In Neutrality and Neutralism in the Global Cold War: Between or Within the Blocs? Edited by Sandra Bott, Jussi M. Hanhimäki, Janick Schaufelbuehl and Marco Wyss. New York: Routledge, 2016.

CHAPTER 2

Conceptual Approaches to Foreign Policy and Application to African Countries

Introduction This chapter addresses the pertinent question of approaches to understanding foreign policy-making. Scholars have long debated whether the theories that explain foreign policy, overwhelmingly developed in western countries, are likely to explain the same phenomena elsewhere, especially in the Global South. Theories and approaches such as Almond’s Mood theory, domestic audience costs, bureaucratic politics, Groupthink, poliheuristic theory or foreign policy approaches that explain foreign policy in democracies have limited explanatory power over African countries, OAU and AU’s institutional foreign policy. This chapter examines the existence, absence, role and the sources of foreign policy in Africa—elites, bureaucracies, citizens, domestic audiences and the external stakeholders in the making of foreign policy. Foreign policy is a more recent area of growth in scholarship in global politics, and theory-testing around who the key actors, ideas and approaches continue to evolve. Though Africa’s post-colonial foreign policy was partly informed by colonial experiences and residual colonization, limited educational and political participation during colonialism impacted the ability of citizens to direct foreign policy and gave elites much latitude in crafting foreign policy. Still, once-consensus national, regional and pan-African goals were swept up in personality disagreements and regional vendettas. Still, understanding foreign policy from a theoretical perspective is invaluable; this chapter © The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2021 S. M. Magu, Explaining Foreign Policy in Post-Colonial Africa, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-62930-4_2

19

20

S. M. MAGU

examines approaches that are more, or less likely, to explain foreign policy in Africa. What informs countries’ interests, preferences, choices and foreign policy decisions? Realist theory argues that states are functionally similar and their interests and interactions are informed by pursuit of, among others, security and power. Other theories herald cooperation: norms, rules and institutions promote cooperation (neoliberalism). Still others suggest shared values, interests and ideologies such as democratization, cooperation and peace can reduce conflict and increase cooperation (constructivism), even as the exploitative nature of powerful (core) states against weaker (dependent) states explains international interactions (Marxist theories). The ‘national interest’ is historically a perceived source of states’ interests articulated through foreign policy actions. The ‘national interest’ stems from the preferences of domestic audiences, interest groups, bureaucracies and elites. But try as one might, some countries evidently show little interest in gaining power, and whether all states are functionally equal is a fair question, as is the level of citizenry involvement in foreign policy-making. This extends to the theories explaining foreign policy-making and processes, including, for example, Almond’s Mood theory. African countries have tended to approach foreign policy as a ‘bloc’—at the UN and other IGOs, and the proliferation of RECs suggests that Africa might be functionally different from other regions. Theories of foreign policy-making are still relatively new, and primarily based on the experiences of western nations. Granted, states are functionally similar, but just as development of states and economies cannot be explained by the same theories, one imagines the same to be true for foreign policy-making. There are many possible explanans and conceptualization of foreign policy-making, examined in detail in this chapter. Of great import is the question of whether they also explain African countries’ foreign policy individually and institutionally. Pending the analysis, it helps to reflect on why they may not be universally applicable. The impact of democracy and domestic audiences is expected to have a significant impact; so too, is the reality that most western countries have, at some point, been great powers with different considerations than those of African countries. The sources and impacts of domestic sources of foreign policy have been especially infused with Euro-Atlantic, but predominantly American perspectives and explanations. For the hegemon, the maxim that ‘politics

2

CONCEPTUAL APPROACHES TO FOREIGN POLICY …

21

stops at the water’s edge’ is a truism. The unitary nature of the state in its interactions with others is aptly captured: “when it comes to foreign policy, American political leaders should speak with one voice-a distinction from the cacophony that marks domestic policy making.”1 A clear distinction between domestic and foreign policy-making exists; even as states are considered unitary actors, obvious ideological divisions within states manifest and globally. There are often stakes and levels of support for factions within the US, partly based on expected future relations. But since there is rare ability to constrain actions, e.g., pulling the US out of the JCPOA, Paris Climate Accords or TPP, the illusion of states as a unitary actor persists. The preponderance of American power and influence on global politics especially post-Cold War makes sense, but is inherently risky as a source of explanation for other global phenomena. The US is unlike many other countries, even among its peers. It derives its character from unique historical, social, cultural and political basis that set it from almost every other country even liberal democracies. Its political system is peculiar, with robustly (almost) co-equal branches of government, domestic audiences, the Dahl-ian, key components of a democracy, a “harmonious system of mutual frustration.”2 Where US policy-makers might be concerned about domestic audiences, other countries, e.g., Chad’s leaders might face fewer constraints and opposition. Governments, internal political mechanisms and checks and balances often confer foreign policy-making to the whims, sometimes expertise, of a pliant elite cabal, driven by concerns such as history, regime survival and their own well-being. This brings us back to the important question: Do foreign policymaking structures especially in Africa mirror the US and developed countries? Can African countries’ foreign policy-making be explained by theories derived out of the Euro-Atlantic Westphalian state? Africa epitomizes the world of difference in social, economic and political processes

1 Helen V. Milner and Dustin Tingley, Sailing the Water’s Edge: The Domestic Politics of American Foreign Policy (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2015), 1. 2 Larry N. Gerston, American Federalism: A Concise Introduction (Armonk: M. E. Sharpe, 2007), 35.

22

S. M. MAGU

and conditions from the west, and the use of western theoretical frameworks to understand African issues has led to little progress.3 A cursory survey of the civilization missions of Europe, pseudo-scientific ideas of superiority that gave us slavery, the misadventures of colonialism, traditional theories of economic development, Washington Consensus, Structural Adjustment Programs, multiparty democracy and other issues illustrate their incompatibility with African realities. Explanans of Africa’s foreign policy stem from the western world; they rarely apply to Africa.

Parsing Process: Considering Theories and Foreign Policy Theory is as a body of statements that systematize knowledge of and explain phenomena. They consist of general, verifiable statements that explain why things happen and offer specific and empirically testable predictions.4 IR theories are “a system of generalizations,”5 “a collection of stories about international politics [which] relies upon IR myths in order to appear to be true.”6 Scholars can evaluate whether hypotheses predict or explain reality. Theories provide “cumulative knowledge about hitherto unexplained phenomena,”7 and “provide intellectual order to the subject matter of international relations. They enable us to conceptualise and contextualise both past and contemporary events. They also provide us with a range of ways of interpreting complex issues […] they

3 Some scholars, e.g., Acharya and Buzan (2001) the preponderance and overwhelming source of western and absence of Global South IR theories, even though the major powers have inordinate influence on world affairs. 4 Janet Johnson and H. T. Reynolds, Political Science Research Methods (Thousand Oaks: CQ Press, 2015). 5 Yaqing Qin, “Why Is There No Chinese International Relations Theory?” In Amitav Acharya and Barry Buzan, Eds., Non-Western International Relations Theory: Perspectives on and Beyond Asia (London: Routledge, 2010), 26. 6 Cynthia Weber, International Relations Theory: A Critical Introduction (London: Routledge, 2001), 2. 7 Colin Elman and Miriam Elman, “Introduction: Appraising Progress in International Relations Theory.” In Colin Elman and Miriam Elman, Eds., Progress in International Relations Theory: Appraising the Field (Cambridge: BCSIA, 2003), 1

2

CONCEPTUAL APPROACHES TO FOREIGN POLICY …

23

help us think critically, logically and coherently.”8 Social science theories have downsides, including perceived inferiority by natural sciences, impossibility of empirically testing some propositions and difficulty predicting human behavior in different populations.9 One attribute of theory is empirical generalization.10 Robust theories explaining the [process of] foreign policy [making] should hold true universally; otherwise, inconsistencies require reconsideration. Even as differences between states and citizens abound, there are few existing theories using sociocultural and religious factors to explain global politics. Acharya and Buzan restate that most extant theory derives from European model of statehood and interstate interactions.11 Asia, they argue, is “the site of the only contemporary non-Western concentration of power and wealth even remotely comparable to the West”12 that has had significant IR interactions. They also contend that “western IRT (international relations theory) is both too narrow in its sources and too dominant in its influence to be good for the health of the wider project to understand the social world in which we live.”13 Other regions that proportionally contribute to the non-western world in which IR interactions occur should be considered in proposing theory and the implications considered. The terms ‘IR theory’ and ‘foreign policy’ are often used interchangeably. Some consider foreign policy analysis a sub-field of IR. Hellmann

8 Scott Burchill, “Introduction.” In Scott Burchill, Richard Devetak and Andrew Linklater, Eds., Theories of International Relations, 2nd Ed. (New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2001), 13. 9 Milja Kurki and Colin Wright, “International Relations and Social Science.” In Tim Dunne, Milja Kurki and Steve Smith, Eds., International Relations Theories (London: Oxford University Press, 2013). 10 Other attributes include empirical verification, falsifiability, non-normative research, cumulative nature of research, its explanatory function, prediction, probabilistic explanation and parsimony (Johnson and Reynolds, 2015). 11 Amitav Acharya and Barry Buzan, “Why Is There No Non-Western International Relations Theory? An Introduction.” In Amitav Acharya and Barry Buzan, Eds., Non-Western International Relations Theory: Perspectives on and Beyond Asia (London: Routledge, 2010). 12 Acharya and Buzan, “Why Is There No Non-Western International Relations Theory?” (2001), 2. 13 Acharya and Buzan, “Why Is There No Non-Western International Relations Theory?” (2001), 2.

24

S. M. MAGU

and Urrestarazu propose “‘systemic’ IR, which provides a bird’s-eye view on the whole international system as a whole, and ‘sub-systemic’ foreign policy analysis (FPA), which zooms in on the placement and actions of states considered to be the most fundamental unit of this system.”14 Palmer and Morgan propose an approach where foreign policy defies single issues; rather, it is the process of “a state constructing bundles of policies – what we will call portfolios – that, in combination, are designed to achieve things – outcomes – that the state wants.”15 Beach argues that “the study of foreign policy does not require a unique FPA theoretical toolbox,”16 but apprehending choices and decisions policy-makers arrive at has intrinsic value outside of theory. Given gaps between theories and their explanatory power of states’ foreign policies, the actions warrant study. The goal of study is not developing an Africa-centric theory; rather, its task is to understand foreign policy-making in Africa.

Contemporary Theories of Foreign Policy Comparative foreign policy analysis (FPA) is an alternative explanation of foreign policy processes. That said, Smith questions whether FPA is an attempt at an empirical study of non-scientific ideas, implying that it is a pseudoscience.17 FPA stems from a systemic analysis of the international system, the playground for actors’ interactions. Granted, mainstay IR theories—realism, liberalism, constructivism and Marxism—were developed to explain interactions between actors in the international system in the past century, making such studies nascent. There was a concurrent idea, behavioralism, which classical realists such as Hans Morgenthau articulated in the seminal work Politics Among Nations. Deriving from studying and understanding human nature, Morgenthau argued that variables such as power, self-interest and morality inform human behavior, but also, that the conduct among nations.

14 Gunther Hellmann and Ursula Stark Urrestarazu, Theories of Foreign Policy (Oxford Bibliographies, 2013), n.p. 15 Glenn Palmer and Clifton Morgan, A Theory of Foreign Policy (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2006), 2. 16 Derek Beach, Analyzing Foreign Policy (New York: Palgrave Macmillan 2012), 6. 17 Steve Smith, “Theories of Foreign Policy: An Historical Overview.” Review of

International Studies, Vol. 12 (1986): 13–29.

2

CONCEPTUAL APPROACHES TO FOREIGN POLICY …

25

Behavioralism as applied to the broader IR discipline is confounding, considering states are functionally similar, and therefore, they override understanding the actions of leaders and decision-makers. Besides Morgenthau’s work, Waltz’s Theory of International Politics, with three levels of analysis (individual, state and international system), provide explanations of the impact of individuals’ actions, while the third level of analysis implies international interactions, the domain of foreign policy. FPA “attempts to understand foreign policy by treating states as members of a class of phenomena and seeks to generalize about the sources, and nature, of their behaviour, focusing on the decision-making process in its varying aspects in order to produce explanations.”18 It uses empirically testable ‘models of decision-making’ and ‘decision rules.’ Hudson examines and then aggregates existing FPA scholarship, producing several FPA ‘hallmarks.’ FPA is multi-factorial, multilevel, multi-disciplinary, integrative, agent-oriented, actor specific approach.19 Nonetheless, there is no consensus on any elements of FPA models: number, key variables and threshold of models, model robustness or which models explain the processes. Foreign policy-making is not sufficiently specified or the differences between decision rules and decisionmaking articulated. Table 2.1 outlines six models based on the works of Norwich University, Mingst and Arreguín-Toft, Mintz and Sofrin, and Yetiv. The main foreign policy analysis models are Rational Actor or Rational Choice Model, organizational processes, bureaucratic politics, groupthink, and prospect theory and poliheuristic models. Most of the models include all the variables, while several FPA models appear only once. The Mingst-Arreguín-Toft elite model has elements of bureaucratic politics model. Other theories include interbranch politics and political processes20 ; elite, pluralist and constructivist theory,21 the Bounded

18 Smith, “Theories of Foreign Policy”, 14 19 Valerie M Hudson, Foreign Policy Analysis: Classic and Contemporary Theory

(Lanham: Rowman & Littlefield, 2014), 8. 20 Norwich University, “5 Key Approaches to Foreign Policy Analysis.” Diplomacy (Norwich University Online, 2017). https://online.norwich.edu/academic-programs/res ources/5-key-approaches-to-foreign-policy-analysis. 21 Karen A. Mingst and Ivan M. Arreguín-Toft, Essentials of International Relations (New York: W.W. Norton, 2016).

26

S. M. MAGU

Table 2.1 Some foreign policy theories Model /Scholar(s) General

Norwich

Mingst & Arreguim-Toft

Mintz + Sofrin

Yetiv

Rational actor model Organizational processes Bureaucratic politics model Groupthink approach Prospect /loss aversion Poliheuristic model

X

X

X

X

X

X

X

X

X

?

X

X

X

X

X

X

?

?

?

X

X

?

?

X

?

X

?

?

X

?

Rationality/Cybernetic Model/Cybernetic Theory of decision-making22 and government politics, cognitive model and domestic politics.23 Jackson and Sørensen apply foreign policy analysis, bureaucratic structures and processes, the comparative approach (based on behavioral foundations of policy-making), the cognitive processes and psychology approach (which often includes the ‘evoked set’),24 the ‘perception and misperception’ approach,25 the ‘multilevel and multidimensional approach’ and a social constructivist approach to explain foreign policymaking. This is the intersubjective view of foreign policy-making

22 Alex Mintz and Amnon Sofrin, “Decision Making Theories in Foreign Policy Analysis,” Oxford Research Encyclopedias (World Politics), (October 2017). https://doi.org/ 10.1093/acrefore/9780190228637.013.405. 23 Steve Yetiv, Explaining Foreign Policy: U.S. Decision-Making and the Persian Gulf War (Baltimore: JHU Press, 2004). 24 Evoked set defines situations in which “actors are prone to think that the matters that worry them and/or they are focused on, are the main focus of attention of other actors” (de Castro 2009: 34). 25 See Jervis’ 1976 work titled Perception and Misperception in International Politics. Jackson and Sørensen also address components, processes and outcomes of perception, including, e.g. cognitive consistency and interactions, assimilation of information, and common misperceptions, etc.; see also Tang (2013).

2

CONCEPTUAL APPROACHES TO FOREIGN POLICY …

27

proposed by constructivists26 ; several approaches thereof are discussed next. Jackson and Sørensen’s model, with its five elements, begins with the foreign policy analysis approach, which they argue is “traditionally the domain of diplomatic historians and public commentators.”27 This ‘official,’ ‘traditional’ approach reserved foreign policy and diplomacy to ‘experts’ and “leading state officials (emperors, kings, presidents, prime ministers, chancellors, secretaries of state, foreign ministers, defense secretaries, etc., and their closest advisors).”28 Practitioners of this approach include Henry Kissinger and George F. Kennan. The comparative approach to foreign policy is based on behavioralism; it systematically builds theories from analyzing large datasets. Rosenau’s analysis and synthesis of five variables, i.e., idiosyncratic, role, government, societal and systematic variables, ranked by importance and based on sort factors such as polity size29 were central to this approach. Jackson and Sørensen propose the bureaucratic structures and processes approach, focusing on organizational decision-making processes. Graham Allison’s Essence of Decision—its analysis and conclusions the subject of heated intellectual debate—is the central influence to this approach, and focuses on the relative interests, strengths and functions of different bureaucracies in the same polity, based on three premises: rational actor model/theory/approach, information and decisions reached based on the best interests of each government bureaucracy, individual decisionmakers’ bargaining and decisions favoring own goals, desired outcomes and competing interests (e.g., State Department’s goals to peacefully resolve the Cuban Missile Crisis against the Defense Department obligation to win a potential war, and the Commerce Department’s preference for economic tools (embargoes and sanctions) to resolve the crisis, limiting economic harm to one’s own and regional interests.30 The fourth, cognitive processes and psychology approach focuses on individual decision-makers, pathologies and fears that influence their

26 Robert H. Jackson and Georg Sørensen, Introduction to International Relations: Theories and Approaches (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2013). 27 Jackson and Sørensen, Introduction to International Relations (2013), 254. 28 Jackson and Sorensen, Introduction to International Relations (2013), 254. 29 Jackson and Sørensen, Introduction to International Relations (2013), 254. 30 Jackson and Sørensen, Introduction to International Relations, 255.

28

S. M. MAGU

decisions. George H. W. Bush’s reading of Neville Chamberlain’s autobiography and the Munich appeasement is seen as informing Bush’s determination to avoid another Munich after Iraq’s invasion of Kuwait in 1990. Conversely, Saddam‘s morbid fear of assassination led him to using many body doubles, while leaders of reclusive states rarely travel outside their countries for fear of assassination plots against them. Leaders’ reactions, actions, reactions and decisions frequently reflect their perception of the ‘self,’ the ‘other,’ their pathologies, and motives, real or perceived. The fifth model is the ‘multilevel and multidimensional approach’; its central feature and contribution is the recognition that there are different approaches to explaining foreign policy, actors, relationships and interests, measured against constraints in international politics. Besides these models, scholars have identified ‘decision rules’ related to group decision-making. They include groupthink (or polythink) which can be cohesive or fragmented; groupthink-polythink continuum, a rule characterized by scholars as a foreign policy approach rather than a decision rule, ranging from ‘completely cohesive’ (groupthink) to totally fragmented (polythink) with myriad points of views and possible deadlock.31 In the mid-range of the groupthink-polythink continuum is the Con-Div Group Dynamic—that is, “a balanced group dynamic in which neither groupthink nor polythink dominates.”32 The final decision rule is the two-group decision model, which shows elements of bureaucratic politics. Two-group decision model can function as small, select groups (e.g., elites), or larger groups within the continuum, reflecting a Prisoner’s Dilemma challenge, unless both groups are closer to the middle in the groupthink-polythink continuum. Rational Actor Model/Rational Choice Theory Rational Choice Theory stems from mostly economic approaches to decision-making, but has since found utility across disciplines: for political scientists, this includes public choice, neoclassicism (per economists), to expected utility (psychologists) and rational choices (sociologists).33 31 Mintz and Sofrin, “Decision Making Theories in Foreign Policy Analysis,” (2017). 32 Mintz and Sofrin, “Decision Making Theories in Foreign Policy Analysis,” (2017),

n.p. 33 Mary Zey, Rational Choice Theory and Organizational Theory: A Critique (Thousand Oaks: Sage, 1997), 1

2

CONCEPTUAL APPROACHES TO FOREIGN POLICY …

29

RAM/RCT has significant crossover: psychology matters in foreign policy decision-making, so does economics. RAM/RCT was originally a conceptual framework for economic—and recently—social behavior. Some assumptions hold universally across the conception of rational choice, including decision-making to further individual welfare or ‘utility maximization.’34 Understanding the choices made by a rational actor— all actors are assumed to be rational despite often having incomplete information or other actors’ choices—is challenging. Defining rationality is important; Breuning holds that rationality is simply the demand that the means, or the policy choices—are logically connected to the ends—or the leader’s [actor’s] goals.35 Though what to one actor might not appear rational might to another, the process of arriving at a decision can meet the rationality criteria. Although actors act in their best (rational) interests, constraints can stem from insufficient information, the environment and the effects of the decision. Assessing other actors’ responses and capabilities might influence the decision that a rational actor makes based on expected reactions. Further, decisions present social dilemmas, including shirking contribution and responsibility, the perennial free-rider problem, the moral hazard, the credible commitment dilemma, generalized social exchange, tragedy of the commons, exchanges of threats and violent confrontations.36 The foregoing medley notwithstanding, Oppenheimer provides perhaps a succinct definition of theory of rational choice, arguing that it “presumes decisions to be the result of conscious choice made by individuals to further the realization of their own preferences.”37 This definition captures consensus elements of RCT: actors’ preferences, expected utility,

34 Donald Green and Ian Shapiro, Pathologies of Rational Choice Theory: A Critique of Applications in Political Science (New Haven: Yale, 1994). 35 Marijke Breuning, Foreign Policy Analysis: A Comparative Introduction (New York:

Palgrave Macmillan, 2007), 3. 36 Elinor Ostrom, “A Behavioral Approach to the Rational Choice Theory of Collective Action: Presidential Address, APSA, 1997.” The American Political Science Review, Vol. 92, No. 1 (March, 1998): 1–22. https://doi.org/10.2307/2585925. 37 Joe Oppenheimer, Principles of Politics: A Rational Choice Theory Guide to Politics and Social Justice (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2012), 15.

30

S. M. MAGU

instrumental rationality and transitivity in preferences, cost-benefit analysis preceding decision-making, self-interest and utility maximization.38 To these, Zey adds scarcity of resources and differential access thereto, opportunity costs (related to cost-benefit analysis), institutional norms which act as constraints (institutions to include family, school, church, government, other organizations), and access (or availability) of full information (considering that actors rarely possess perfect or full information to aid in decision-making).39 Mintz and Sofrin outline an 8-step decision-making process. They include (i) identifying the problem; (ii) articulating and ranking goals; (iii) gathering information; (iv) identifying plausible alternatives, (v) analyzing alternatives and calculating costs and benefits for each option and the likelihood of success; (vi) selecting choices (alternatives) for maximum utility; (vii) implementing the chosen alternative; and (viii) monitoring and evaluating the chosen option; repeating the process if the selected option is sub-optimal.40 Challenge to optimal (if not rational) decision-making is further enhanced by repeated interactions (enter Game Theory), particularly given the constraints in information, shadow of the future (one time, or repeated interactions with other actors) and the initial choice actors make, e.g., cooperation or non-cooperation, tit for tat, defecting.41 Foreign policy is primarily about interstate relations, though domestic audiences in states and actors outside them affect foreign policy-making and by extension, global politics. This discussion therefore holds that actors (states) are rational actors, as they perceive their choices and preferences.42 States’ preferences stem from the ‘national interest,’ their raison d’être,’ whose definition includes “an end that is defined by rational

38 Lina Eriksson, Rational Choice Theory: Potential and Limits (New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2011), 17, and Oppenheimer, Principles of Politics, 14–19. 39 Zey, Rational Choice Theory and Organizational Theory, 3. 40 Mintz and Sofrin, “Decision Making Theories in Foreign Policy Analysis,” 2017. 41 Ostrom, “A Behavioral Approach to the Rational Choice Theory of Collective

Action,” 1998. 42 Stephen D. Krasner, Defending the National Interest: Raw Materials Investments and U.S. Foreign Policy (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1978), and Steve Yetiv, Explaining Foreign Policy: U.S. Decision-Making in the Gulf Wars (Baltimore: John Hopkins, 2011).

2

CONCEPTUAL APPROACHES TO FOREIGN POLICY …

31

consideration of what leads to the benefit of the society, and by a normative choice of where the good of the whole lies.”43 It includes the strategies to advance the good, public choices necessary to maintain it, and the “obligation to protect and promote the good of the society,” and to “protect the society from outside threats.”44 Krasner holds that for preferences to be considered the national interest, “the ordering of goals must persist over time.”45 National interest “is generally viewed as embodying certain lasting values”46 resulting in “a set of transitively ordered state preferences concerned to promote the general well-being of the society that persists over a long time.”47 Krasner’s definition requires that constituent preferences “do not consistently benefit a particular class or group, and that they last over an extended period of time.”48 Frankel links national interest to foreign policy; restated in Holloway, “foreign policy is defined as ‘a formulation of desired outcomes which are intended (or expected) to be consequent upon decisions adopted (or made) by those who have authority (or ability) to commit the machinery of the state and a significant fraction of national resources to that end,’ national interest describes the desired outcomes.”49 Ole Holsti’s definition revolves around “survival, security, power, and relative capabilities.”50 Holloway holds that, “if we see a state pursuing a certain goal or policy, over a long period of time, despite changes in leadership, and if that goal can be justified as being in the interest of society as a whole, then we have found a national interest.”51 This mirrors Krasner’s 3-component national interest definition consisting 43 W. David Clinton, The Two Faces of National Interest (Baton Rouge: LSU Press, 1994), 52. 44 Steven Kendall Holloway, Canadian Foreign Policy: Defining the National Interest

(Peterborough: Broadview Press, 2006), 52, and Joseph Frankel, National Interest (London: Palgrave Macmillan, 1970), n.p. 45 Krasner, Defending the National Interest, 44. 46 Krasner, Defending the National Interest, 44. 47 Krasner, Defending the National Interest, 45. 48 Krasner, Defending the National Interest, 43. 49 Holloway, Canadian Foreign Policy, 12. 50 Ole R. Holsti, “Theories of International Relations.” In Michael J. Hogan and Thomas G. Paterson, Eds., Explaining the History of American Foreign Relations, 2nd Ed. (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2004), 54. 51 Holloway, Canadian Foreign Policy, 12.

32

S. M. MAGU

of (i) objectives related to general societal goals; (ii) persistence over time; and (iii) a consistent ranking of importance.52 African countries do have some overall national goal, often insufficiently articulated. Some interests are historical, circumstantial and others are formulated in reaction to system stimuli. For example, a web search of ‘Kenya’s national interest’ is uninspiring. According to a Maina Chege’s blog entry on Quora, it boils down to ‘trade.’ Goldman’s list of ‘the most vital of these national interests’ include “preservation of territorial integrity, establishment of peace and security within the nation, maintenance of law and order, consolidation of a developed, mature and versatile political system and assurance of national development.”53 On the National Interest (Kenya) page which features three articles last updated in 2013, the Al-Shabaab menace, militancy in the East African region, and the ICC’s post-election violence cases account for Kenya’s national interest. Wario articulates it as bilateral and multilateral relationships, trade and security actions that enhance Kenya’s capacity to improve its citizens’ lives.54 The first official written 34-page foreign policy document was issued in 2014, 51 years after independence. Although focusing Iraq, Breuning’s discussion on the logic of Saddam’s incursion into Kuwait shows how irrational preferences can be pursued. Saddam had other avenues of intimidation or coercion, including “amassing troops on the border to underscore a threat. […] He could have gone to the Arab League or the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) to address his grievances. He could have called for a summit meeting with the leaders of Kuwait […] He could even have decided to do nothing at all.”55 The premise of foreign policymaking suggests a deliberative process, but decisions are often made by an individual or small group of elites in groupthink conditions. Some foreign policy decisions (e.g., Saddam’s 1990 invasion of Kuwait or Idi Amin’s invasion of Tanzania in 1978) are questionable and irrational. Breuning holds that with some decisions, “it can be quite difficult to figure out whether a foreign policy decision was based on sound analysis and careful 52 Krasner, Defending the National Interest, 44. 53 Goldman, David, “GoK Must Protect National Interests.” National Interest (Web)

(January 20, 2015), n.p. 54 Wario, Hukka, “Security Main Pillar of National Interest,” The Star (January 9, 2015). 55 Breuning, Foreign Policy Analysis, 7.

2

CONCEPTUAL APPROACHES TO FOREIGN POLICY …

33

thought.”56 Whether in Africa’s absolute autocracies or liberal democracies such as Botswana, RAM/RCT tenets are generalizable; every actor perceives some benefit in the actions they take, even though one’s actor’s rationality does not necessarily apply to all actors or situations. Rationality is relative. African leaders’ self-interest is often conflated with foreign policy, conveniently feeding the argument that leaders’ political survival is intertwined with nations’ interests. Fearing loss of power, adulation, personal wealth and privilege, rationality dictates that holding on to power is more likely if leaders’ interest and national interest is conflated. Leaders point citizens to perceived threats to the state and themselves, procuring support especially in Africa’s post-colonial states. Complex foreign relations are entrusted to leaders, completing the loop of state-leader-foreign policy. Kenya’s ICC case illustrates this: when hauled to The Hague, Kenya’s Ocampo Six embarked on a cross-country, cross-continent campaign suggesting bias and labeling the ICC ‘the court for Africans.’ The effort to end the prosecutions was wrapped in sovereignty; when Uhuru Kenyatta was elected president in 2013, claims of neo-colonialism gained traction and African countries, which shared Kenya’s view, urged disbanding the ICC, mass withdrawal of signatures, refusing to cooperate and cessation of disproportionate targeting of African leaders. Organizational Processes Model Foreign policy-making as a function of organizational processes model was first advanced by Graham Allison in Essence of Decision, analyzing the Cuban Missile Crisis. The model’s central premise is that foreign policy decisions are a product of bureaucracies, people, processes, capacities and limitations within a group rather than rational processes and outcomes. In the US, the Department of Defense must always prepare for war, the State Department plans for peace and diplomacy, both counter to each other. Decision-making is then a function of bureaucracy with vested interests. The theory focuses on “decision-making in general, and on the role of the decision-making units – particularly small groups – in this process.”57 56 Breuning, Foreign Policy Analysis, 5. 57 Walter Carlsnaes, “Foreign Policy.” In Walter Carlsnaes, Thomas Risse-Kappen, and

Beth A. Simmons, Eds., Handbook of International Relations (Thousand Oaks: Sage, 2002).

34

S. M. MAGU

Allison adds that presidents do not usually make foreign policy choices without deliberation. Yet, as is the case with outliers, the 45th US president repeatedly articulated instinct and smarts as basis of exempting him from rigors of bureaucratic decision-making processes even when it hurts the US, its interests and allies. Systems work better when their elements work in tandem. For example, if the US president travels to meet with troops in a warzone, different elements must work together. Taber argues that “the foreign policy-making system is distributed among a variety of organizational, small group, and individual actors”58 even though some actors may not directly contribute to foreign policy-making, as part of their work. Organizations do function based on standard operating procedures (SOPs), goals, traditions, cooperation and organizational priorities. Leaders, however, can signal their perceived priorities—for example, some presidencies designate US ambassadors to the UN as a Cabinet-level position while others do not. Cooperation among bureaucracies tasked with competing missions is common. Finally visiting an active warzone after more than a year in office, US President Donald Trump griped that he flew in a “darkened plane with all windows closed, with no light anywhere; pitch black,”59 despite spending $7 trillion60 in the Middle East and going in has to be under this massive cover, with planes all over and all of the greatest equipment in the world, and you do everything to get in safely.”61 Despite his Twitter feed “going dark” and arousing suspicion, such visits to warzones are carefully choreographed. During President Obama‘s Iraq visit in 2009 in the middle of a sandstorm that interrupted travel from the airport to the Green Zone, with the Iraqi PM at his residence, challenges transporting him to the airport and the Secret Service’s concern over the security of Baghdad, President Obama visited Camp Victory, adjoining

58 Charles Taber, “The Interpretation of Foreign Policy Events: A Cognitive Process Theory.” In Donald Sylvan and James Voss, Eds., Problem Representation in Foreign Policy Decision-Making (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1998), 30. 59 Felicia Sonmez, “Trump’s Iraq Visit Prompts Concern Over Operational Security,” The Washington Post (December 26, 2018). 60 This figure issues from the president. Few estimates suggest that the US spent that much money on the two wars. 61 Sonmez, “Trump’s Iraq Visit Prompts Concern Over Operational Security,” n.p.

2

CONCEPTUAL APPROACHES TO FOREIGN POLICY …

35

the US Embassy.62 “Everyone that day – meteorologists, mechanics, Secret Service, and military guards – properly followed their organization’s routines and procedures, designed to ensure the safety of the president and other American personnel.”63 Doing their jobs in the face of intervening factors, bureaucracies can succeed and even cooperate to achieve a common goal. For some scholars, the organizational behavior model is the “basis of the perspective on the organization,”64 a limited element of the organizational process constraining variety and flexibility. Strategic interactions between decision-makers in an organization contribute to foreign policy, particularly where bureaucracies are well organized and the chain of authority and succession is clear. In the US, the president, the Vice President, the Secretaries of State, Energy, Defense and Homeland Security are members of the US National Security Council. Other countries have a clear hierarchy: Kenya’s President, deputy president, Cabinet Secretaries for defense, foreign affairs, Interior and Co-ordination of National Government, Attorney General, Chief of Kenya Defense Forces, DirectorGeneral of the National Intelligence Service and Inspector-General of the National Police Service are members of the National Security Council.65 In other countries, it is opaque: Who, for instance, is the potential heir to North Korea’s Kim Jong-un? The role, work and outcomes of foreign policy decision-making are often clear; through the organizational process, organizations show themselves to be purposeful and habitual actors that shape human behavior (conceptually, through organizational essence, structure and culture), the outputs they produce, and that their actions are foreign policy outputs, not products of a unitary state, but as very conscious, self-guided entities.66 The process facilitates integration and coordination of government 62 Nikolas Gvosdev, Jessica Blankshain and David Cooper, Decision-Making in American Foreign Policy: Translating Theory into Practice (New York: Cambridge University Press, 2019). 63 Gvosdev, et al., Decision-Making in American Foreign Policy (2019), 126. 64 Melania-Gabriela Ciot, Negotiation and Foreign Policy Decision Making (Newcastle

upon Tyne: Cambridge, 2014). 65 Standard media Editor, “National Security Council Has Agenda in Plain Sight,” Standard Media (Digital) (June 4, 2013). https://www.standardmedia.co.ke/article/200 0085165/national-security-council-has-agenda-in-plain-sight. 66 Gvosdev, et al., Decision-Making in American Foreign Policy (2019), 127.

36

S. M. MAGU

functions to insure success but also security for functions of state, defense, foreign policy, etc., this requires collaboration of various elements, people, places, ideas, process and activities, although counter-arguments point to the government politics model. Process-wise, foreign policy decisions are not “merely the outcomes of organizations following standard operating procedures. They are ‘resultants’ of various bargaining games among bureaucratic players within the government.”67 The origin of bureaucratic politics model is the behavioral approach.68 This approach may lend itself to better analysis through the lenses of western countries—and application of management of a decision-making group that informs Allison’s Essence of Decision during the Cuban Missile Crisis. In the run-up to the 2003 Iraq War, the crisis group did not necessarily produce a different outcome.69 Even in other developed countries, it is unclear that this is the regular foreign policy decision-making process. In leading democracies, electoral systems reward political parties and their agendas; winning coalitions do not always continue policies pursued by outgoing opposition governments. Foreign policy-making in post-independence Africa fell to groups with global exposure: in Nigeria, it was the Prime Minister’s office, ministries— External Affairs, Defense, Finance, Economic Development, Commerce and Industry, Information, Education and Parliament.70 Low-level decisions could be carried out by lower-level functionaries. Even though there was bureaucratic support—in research, travel, communication, briefings and initiating contacts, bureaucracies simply supported positions staked by elites, especially presidents, although sources of foreign policy divisions actions can be trivial. This is illustrated by a 2018 accusation leveled against Tanzania by Kenya, of burning 5000 one-day-old chicks.71 A meeting between Presidents Kenyatta and Magufuli declared the problem 67 Bruce Russett, Harvey Starr and David Kinsella, World Politics: The Menu for Choice (Boston: Cengage, 2010), 117. 68 Patrick J. Haney, Organizing for Foreign Policy Crises: Presidents, Advisers, and the Management of Decision Making (Ann Arbor: UMich Press, 2002). 69 Haney, Organizing for Foreign Policy, 2. 70 Ufot Bassey Inamete, Foreign Policy Decision-Making in Nigeria (London: Associated

University Press, 2001), 20. 71 The East African, “Tanzania Destroys Another 5000 Kenya-Sourced Chicks,” The Daily Nation (February 13, 2018). https://www.nation.co.ke/news/Tanzania-destroysanother-5-000-chicks/1056-4303090-r1idwuz/index.html.

2

CONCEPTUAL APPROACHES TO FOREIGN POLICY …

37

solvable, tasking their respective foreign affairs ministries with its resolution. If bureaucracies participate in making foreign policy elsewhere, do they do so in Africa? Many African countries have perfected the art of replicating bureaucracies that mirror western countries,’ but subvert the proper functioning and adopt the worst elements of such bureaucracies. Sure, one can get a passport but a bribe might help, obtaining licenses can also benefit from greasing palms, citizens are assaulted by lawmen on streets and mail frequently fails to reach addressees. Organizationally, countries replicate institutions but not the efficiency to be found in other regions. Policies are often ill-informed. Despite colonial influence and the Cold War realities, African countries had “the privilege of shaping the foreign policy decision-making structures and processes of a newly independent country.”72 Granted, economic dependency, new statehood, limited foreign policy-making experience and expertise, the Cold War and territorial disputes all around the new stats limited African countries’ effectiveness and success. Bureaucratic Politics Model Bureaucracies that run functions of states, including foreign policymaking, have persisted as long as societal organization: as basic units of cities and bureaus, as city-states, as principalities and now, as sovereign nations. Small, sovereign states (Monaco, Palau, Kiribati and Liechtenstein), non-state polities such as the Vatican, and even absolute monarchies and autocracies such as Saudi Arabia and North Korea maintain functional foreign policy bureaucracies. Bureaucracies exist at different levels: state, companies, businesses, secret societies and churches; all are central to societal function. States’ bureaucracies date to the earliest iteration of the modern sovereign state, convened from 1644 to 1648 to sign the Treaty of Westphalia. History suggests that the first six months resolved who sat where.73 Bureaucracies can be traced further back to Moses, when he “organized the tribes of Israel for their departure from

72 Inamete, Foreign Policy Decision-Making in Nigeria, 20. 73 Derek Croxton, “The Peace of Westphalia of 1648 and the Origins of Sovereignty.”

The International History Review, Vol. 21, No. 3 (1999): 569–592. https://www.jstor. org/stable/40109077.

38

S. M. MAGU

Pharaoh’s rule, he organized them into a simple bureaucracy.”74 Romans organized fighting forces into centurions, and into legions.75 Olajide adds that this model “does not perceive there to be a unitary factor; rather it considers many actors to be players – players who focus not on a single strategic issue.”76 A bureaucracy is a “hierarchical arrangement of authority of the field or industry”77 ; “tier or step, and therefore, it signifies the hierarchical arrangement of officialdom or management in the field or industry”78 and stems from the French word for desk, “bureau.” From the 1300s, “the king’s administrators brought their financial records to a special room …and laid them out on brown woolen cloth, known as la bure.”79 In the realm of foreign policy today, this entails running government “through large paraphernalia,”80 giving rise to ‘bureaucratic politics,’ which can be traced back to Graham Allison’s previously alluded to Cuban Missile Crisis analysis. Clifford reiterates Allison’s analysis of bureaucracies that dealt with the crisis: standard operating procedures of the various actors (the US Navy, the CIA and the US Air Force followed their SOPs and decision-making processes, arriving at each bureaucracy’s “outcomes” (doves and hawks) and their versions of the national interest.81 Bureaucracies operate based on three elements: resources, goals and environment,82 and help states formulate foreign policy. They craft and

74 Donald F. Kettl, “Public Bureaucracies.” In R. A. W. Rhodes, Sarah A. Binder and Bert A. Rockman, Eds., The Oxford Handbook of Political Institutions (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2006), 366. 75 Kettl, “Public Bureaucracies,” 2006. 76 Olajide Aluko, “Bureaucratic Politics and Foreign Policy Decision-Making in

Nigeria.” In Timothy M. Shaw and Olajide Aluko, Eds., Nigerian Foreign Policy: Alternative Perceptions and Projections (London: Macmillan, 1983), 78. 77 Ram Nath Sharma and S.S. Chandra, Advanced Industrial Psychology, Volume 1 (New Delhi: Atlantic, 2004), 105, and Kettl, “Public Bureaucracies,” 366. 78 Sharma and Chandra, Advanced Industrial Psychology, 105. 79 Kettl, “Public Bureaucracies,” 366. 80 Sharma and Chandra, Advanced Industrial Psychology, 105. 81 J. Garry Clifford, “Bureaucratic Politics.” In Michael J. Hogan and Thomas

G. Paterson, Eds., Explaining the History of American Foreign Relations, 2nd Ed. (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2004), 91. 82 Peter S. Cleaves, Bureaucratic Politics and Administration in Chile (Berkeley: UC Press, 1974).

2

CONCEPTUAL APPROACHES TO FOREIGN POLICY …

39

implement strategies including “maintaining (and defending) institutional identity or distinct competencies”83 protect turf,84 respond to reputational threats, sustain and even increase funding available to them, improve staffing levels, access state-of-the-art technologies, avoid blame, highlight benefits of their strategies versus others,’ and guard against restructuring, reform or disbanding.85 Even in the same state, they compete vigorously for pre-eminence in decision-making, particularly in areas that overlap, e.g., the US State Department versus Defense Department. They go through the RCT/RAM model but also recognize constraints imposed by competing bureaucracies, leaders’ preferences in the case of signaling (e.g., diplomacy versus military intervention). Bureaucracies are perceived to be “oriented toward the achievement of multiple organization goals,”86 theirs and others. They cooperate with others if cooperation can improve their own position and outcomes. They aim to be effective, pursue self-preservation strategies and aim to demonstrate their indispensability to the foreign policy establishment. Vietnam’s Communist Party showed this as “they sought to hide their true capacities and to bargain with the bureaucratic organ supervising them to get the lowest possible quotas for delivery to the state.”87 Other nefarious bargaining strategies include bribing officers to cover shoddy work.88 In many cases, well-structured, bureaucracies have specific competencies; USAID administers foreign aid, but DoD might be better suited to build schools in restive areas of Afghanistan. African countries’ widely acknowledged poor governance and corruption complicate the formulation and pursuit of foreign policy goals, and raise questions about government efficacy, e.g., in Kenya’s 2020 COVID19 funds use. Donors peg foreign aid and FDI to good governance, but an even bigger issue is the threat of corrupt bureaucracies that may allow 83 Tobias Bach and Kai Wegrich, “Blind Spots, Biased Attention, and the Politics of Non-Coordination.” In Tobias Bach and Kai Wegrich, Eds., The Blind Spots of Public Bureaucracy and the Politics of Non-Coordination (Cham: Palgrave Macmillan, 2019), 15. 84 Turf is defined as “an organization’s formal jurisdiction and its internal mission or identity” (Bach and Wegrich, “The Blind Spots of Public Bureaucracy,” 16). 85 Bach and Wegrich, “Blind Spots,” 2019. 86 Cleaves, Bureaucratic Politics and Administration in Chile, 310. 87 Gareth Porter, Vietnam: The Politics of Bureaucratic Socialism (Ithaca: Cornell

University Press, 1994), 129. 88 Porter, Vietnam, 1994.

40

S. M. MAGU

procurement and use of fraudulent travel documents. Kenya’s experience with the Westgate Mall shooting is a case study. State stability can be affected and impacts might spill over into other countries. Foreign policy decisions thus made may defy rationality and cater more to self-interest. From a politics perspective, corruption produces negative outcomes other than for the beneficiaries and yet, their unintended consequences may affect even the beneficiary. The rationality that goes into bribe-taking may ultimately outweigh the spectrum of costs and benefits thereof. Poor governance diverts resources away from the greatest need. The past twenty years have seen the rise of Jama’atu Ahlis Sunna Lidda’awati wal-Jihad (or Boko Haram), a militant group in Nigeria. Their tactics led to governments around the world pledging and sending military aid in excess of US$400 million to Nigeria’s government.89 Even the most virulently anti-Africa US president pushed through a deal worth $600 million, to support Nigeria’s military including sale of military aircraft. Even with this increased funding, human rights abuses, suspicious counter-terrorism strategies and corruption continue to debilitate Nigeria’s relations with the world and affect the prospects for eliminating Boko Haram. The allegation that former President Goodluck Jonathan‘s National Security Adviser, Sambo Dasuki allegedly “stole more than $2 billion that should have been designated to purchase weapons and other equipment to fight the group,”90 shows the impact of self-interest over the collective good. The challenges of parsing African countries’ foreign policy-making and the effectiveness of bureaucratic politics rest on the assumption that bureaucracies work, are effective and make policy. This is not always true. Strong executive leadership, weak institutions and little oversight, ineffective judicial systems, weak domestic audiences and lack of checks and balances mean that executives single-handedly make decisions. The power to appoint and (dis)appoint bureaucrats without due process, recourse or sanction mean bureaucrats are beholden to countries’ leaders and their whims. In countries such as North Korea, where familial relations are indispensable, regimes are unstable and one’s uncle can be executed with 89 Claire Felter, “Nigeria’s Battle with Boko Haram,” CFR Backgrounder, Council for Foreign Relations (2018). 90 Siobhán O’Grady, “In Nigeria, $2 Billion in Stolen Funds Is Just a Drop in the Corruption Bucket,” Foreign Policy (November 18, 2015), n.p. https://foreignpolicy.com/2015/11/18/in-nigeria-2-billion-in-stolen-funds-is-justa-drop-in-the-corruption-bucket/.

2

CONCEPTUAL APPROACHES TO FOREIGN POLICY …

41

an anti-aircraft gun, foreign policy-making is whimsical and the domain of the dear leader; the bureaucracy implements decisions. Groupthink Approach Groupthink remains largely untested as a theoretical proposition and efforts thereof have been regarded as “little more than the appropriation of Janis’ [the theory’s proponent] terminology to retell already well-known stories of poor decision making.”91 It has become a primary evaluation tool in the foreign policy toolbox, partly because governments’ bureaucracies are charged with functions such as trade negotiations, administering foreign policy programs and advisory roles. As foreign policy-making organs, groups are not a global phenomenon, mostly found in countries with robust bureaucracies. Groupthink is associated with poor decision-making in institutions: a school or department meeting, a board meeting or a group of presidential aides trying to find a path out of the morass of nuclear missiles placed in Cuba. “Despite its popularity […] social scientists routinely complain that groupthink is a poorly specified and largely untested theory.”92 Groupthink is “a process of rationalization that sets in when members of a team begin to think alike. It can be fostered by an organization’s culture or managers who do not tolerate dissent.”93 Poor decisionmaking and inaction become self-reinforcing. “Usually, the more complex an issue, the more likely groupthink can take over; people are less likely to disagree when they don’t have all the facts”94 or when dissent might exclude members from the membership of a valued group. Bordens and Horowitz concur with Sims, adding that “a group becomes driven by consensus seeking; members do not want to rock the boat.”95 This results in bad decisions made by the group, “when they become more concerned

91 Paul Kowert, Groupthink or Deadlock: When Do Leaders Learn from Their Advisors? (Albany: SUNY Press, 2002), 98. 92 Kowert, Groupthink or Deadlock, 97. 93 Ronald R. Sims, Ethics and Corporate Social Responsibility: Why Giants Fall

(Westport: Praeger, 2003), 115. 94 Sims, Ethics and Corporate Social Responsibility, 115. 95 Kenneth Bordens and Irwin A. Horowitz, Social Psychology, 2nd ed. (New York:

Psychology Press, 2012), 321.

42

S. M. MAGU

with keeping up their members’ morale rather than with reaching a realistic decision.”96 This is a vetting of values and getting along, rather than getting things done.97 ‘Sheeple’ disrespects sheep and explains the tendency to follow tragically charismatic leaders to the proverbial hell with its road paved with good intentions. Do individuals think better than in groups, or produce better solutions, outcomes and efficiencies? Per Schafer and Crichlow, Decision-making groups are social entities. They are composed of multiple individuals. They have different types of leaders, with varying degrees of power, who seek to use the groups in a variety of ways. The groups develop their own norms and rules. Other norms and rules may be imposed upon them. They expand and contract. They may alter their behavior in the face of new information.98

Group-based decision-making can have positive outcomes, but formation of “high quality” groups may be limited by notion that its behavior approximates the lowest level of intelligence in the room. “Groupthink results in the group becoming ‘dumber’ than the individual decisionmaker.”99 Bureaucracies can convene groups to give legitimacy to a predetermined outcome or a decision. Schafer and Crichlow identify ‘bad processes’ but identify legitimate questions of groups: leaders’ personality, openness to advice and guidance. Group size and type might be a constraint in decision-making. Is it a one-time, ad hoc group, a task-force, a shadow group or a permanent working group? Does the group have a ‘day job,’ i.e., is it a career-oriented group, or one that is convened for a specific task, given to disband at the conclusion of the particular task? Groups can solve problems with production, deliver (mostly) justice through juries and fight wars together. They are better, even more efficient at “choosing, judging, estimating, and problem solving than are individuals.”100 They research faster, share tasks efficiently, treat 96 Bordens and Horowitz, Social Psychology, 321. 97 Sims, Ethics and Corporate Social Responsibility, 2003. 98 Mark Schafer and Scott Crichlow, Groupthink Versus High-Quality Decision Making

in International Relations (New York: Columbia, 2010), 19. 99 Derek Beach, Analyzing Foreign Policy (New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2012), 126. 100 Donelson R. Forsyth, Group Dynamics (Belmont: Cengage Learning, 2009), 315.

2

CONCEPTUAL APPROACHES TO FOREIGN POLICY …

43

patients better, more accurately, get better outcomes in teams, accomplish more tasks, score better grades and get away with crime more easily.101 Anecdotally, groups can reach better decisions than individuals. If groups are terrible, horrible, no-good at making decisions because they fall prey to groupthink, values-affirming, consensus-seeking and sheeple temptations, among other iniquities, but they also are able to absorb and consider more information/inputs, generate more solutions, possibilities, are more efficient, can research better, solve problems (including the missionary-cannibal dilemma) more efficiently than individual, can they do both? If groupthink is poorly specified, untestable and needs refining or discarding, should it be considered in foreign policy strategies? George responds affirmatively, arguing for subjecting “as best as one can Janis’s prototheory into a broader framework for studying various pathologies of the policy-making process.”102 Paul t’Hart and Kroon did precisely this, redefining and reconfiguring it so that it is not just ‘concurrence-seeking’103 and by parsing the intensity of concurrence-seeking in groupthink (premature, excessive or rigid). The persistent question is whether there are (a) groups charged with foreign policy-making, (b) whether the group provides input into the decision made or (c) whether the group is functional or for show, and like a certain US president, instinct achieves outcomes than deliberative process that finds viable alternatives rather than concurring with the worst decision possible. Literature shows that there are positive and negative outcomes to decision-making groups and there are other issues to keep in mind. Some activities include securing and maintaining the information chain distribution, secretive nature of deliberations (secrecy, deniability) and critical information. An analysis of foreign policy decision-making processes in African countries would be invaluable, to determine if groupthink, or groups,

101 Forsyth, Group Dynamics, 2009. Forsyth argues that Marjorie Shaw, in 1932, found groups to solve problems better and faster, including the missionary-cannibal dilemma problem (or the goat-leopard-hay problem). 102 Alexander George, “From Groupthink to Contextual Analysis of Policy-Making Groups.” In Paul t’Hart, Eric Stern and Bengt Sundelius, Eds., Beyond Groupthink: Political Group Dynamics and Foreign Policy-Making (Ann Arbor: UMich Press, 1997), 43. 103 George, “From Groupthink,” 1997.

44

S. M. MAGU

or even theories help explain their foreign policy. From currently available studies, it is unclear (a) that such information is publicly available for analysis or (b) that there are identifiable groups that deliberate issues of international import in many African countries. One might, however, examine such information as might be available in meetings, delegations, etc.; but absent specific training in the issues and art of diplomacy, would it be remiss to suggest that foreign policy-making is largely whimsical, devoid of group activity, and simply based on the preferences of the country’s leader? Prospect/Loss Aversion Theory In introducing prospect theory (also often conflated with loss aversion theory), Kahneman and Tversky proceed from decision-making theories, adapted from economics (especially rational choice model— choices, preferences, transition, cost-benefit analysis, decision, repeat), while McDermott, Fowler and Smirnov trace its origins to a more ‘primitive’ “risk-sensitive optimal foraging theory to generate an explanation for the origin and function of context-dependent risk aversion and risk-seeking behavior.”104 Prospect/loss aversion stems from situations where “preferences systematically violate the axioms of expected utility theory.”105 Decision-making is “a choice between prospects or risks”106 the former is “a contract that yields an outcome given a probability between zero and 1.”107 Expected utility issues from three possibilities: expectation (utility of outcomes), asset integration (and resultant benefits) and risk aversion (preference of certain outcomes).108 Per Levy, prospect/loss aversion “posits that individuals evaluate outcomes to deviations from a reference point rather than with respect to net asset levels; that their identification of this reference point is a 104 Rose McDermott, James H. Fowler and Oleg Smirnov, “On the Evolutionary Origin of Prospect Theory Preferences.” The Journal of Politics, Vol. 70, No. 2 (2008): 335. https://doi.org/10.1017/s0022381608080341. 105 Daniel Kahneman and Amos Tversky, “Prospect Theory: An Analysis of Decision Under Risk.” In Leonard C. Ziemba and William Maclean, Eds., Handbook of the Fundamentals of Financial Decision Making (Singapore: WSP, 2013), 99. 106 Kahneman and Tversky, “Prospect Theory,” (2013), 99. 107 Kahneman and Tversky, “Prospect Theory,” (2013), 99. 108 Kahneman and Tversky, “Prospect Theory,” (2013).

2

CONCEPTUAL APPROACHES TO FOREIGN POLICY …

45

critical variable, that they give more weight to losses than to comparable gains, and that they are generally risk-averse with respect to gains and risk-acceptant with respect to losses.”109 Levy’s explanation rests on three ‘legs’; gains and losses (not net assets); treatment of gains and losses in two ways (for gains, risk aversion and for losses, risk acceptance) and a discerning treatment of losses versus gains (losses felt more than gains); and that people attach value to gaining and possessing things, and dislike losing than failing gain things (endowment effect).110 McDermott holds “that risk aversion is more likely in the domain of gains and that risk-seeking behavior will tend to occur in the domain of losses.”111 Levy considers prospect theory an experiment in which people have some certainty of gaining or losing money. Behaviorally, people would make different choices if no financial gain is possible. Levy outlines the key concepts in the principle surrounding expected utility and direction of its increase/decrease, the monetary attribution of these changes and the level of possibility of risk acceptance/aversion based on how much they are willing to accept risk. Some outcomes are financial, but decision-making in foreign policy is not always tied to better financial positions. Other benefits may include peace dividend with restive neighbors or improving one’s security. Foreign policy behavior is not measured in economic terms, gains or motivations. Despite Almond’s Mood Theory or economic gains, states may choose non-economic benefits but assure peace. On prospect theory’s application to IR, Levy notes debate in “the theoretical literature on [American], comparative and international politics”112 that often pits social psychology against experimental economics. Contextually, Ross’s 1984 argument shows the USSR willing to defend, not extend its overall gains.113 Levy adds:

109 Jack S. Levy, “An Introduction to Prospect Theory.” Political Psychology, Vol. 13, No. 2 (June, 1992), 171. 110 Levy, “An Introduction to Prospect Theory,” (1992). 111 Rose McDermott, Risk-Taking in International Politics: Prospect Theory in American

Foreign Policy (Ann Arbor: UMich Press, 2001), 13. 112 Levy, “Applications of Prospect Theory to Political Science,” (2003), 215. 113 Levy, “Applications of Prospect Theory to Political Science,” (2003).

46

S. M. MAGU

political leaders might also be led to status quo choices because of reputational interests or domestic pressures, but the values of these other variables might be shaped by loss aversion. Political leaders might be more concerned to prevent a decline in their country’s reputation or credibility than to increase it by a comparable amount or more worried about the costs of falling dominoes than hopeful about the gains from inducing other states to align with them.114

The terms and conditions of prospect theory are not necessarily inapplicable to African countries, even though foreign policy-making outside of major issues of liberation, regional cooperation and continental unity is done by elites. The default assumption of prospect and other foreign policy theories is one of a mostly competitive, zero-sum games, winner-take-all assumptions, rather than cooperation. Kahneman and Tversky posit loss as the default; the primary goal is loss-avoidance. If gains can be spread around, competition needs not the inevitable default. Stein’s gem titled Why States Cooperate proceeds from a worst-case scenario of potential nuclear war with attendant possibilities of a nuclear winter, necessitating de-escalation, collective, cooperative decision-making for survival given Mutually Assured Destruction prospect. Indeed, after 1962’s CMC, there was some détente, de-escalation and better communication between the US and USSR. Even for China, 16 neighbors evoke prospects of cooperation rather than conflict unlike say, Eswatini. Poliheuristic Model/Poliheuristic Choice Theory Foreign policy-making is generally a response to actions and reactions of other actors and the expression of one’s preferences. Rational choice explains some of the process; others are guided by loss aversion. The poliheuristic theory of foreign policy decision-making was first articulated in 1993 as the third foreign policy theory (the others were von Neumann/Morgenstern RAM/RCT and the Simon/Steinbruner

114 Levy, “Applications of Prospect Theory to Political Science,” (2003), 236.

2

CONCEPTUAL APPROACHES TO FOREIGN POLICY …

47

cybernetic approach).115 Taylor-Robinson and Redd’s definition of poliheuristic (choice) theory concerns decision-making processes based on environmental or situational factors and the decision-maker’s cognitive processes (the why and the how).116 The term, poly (many) and heuristic (shortcuts) “(i.e. strategies) decision makers utilize in attempts to simplify complex decision tasks”117 follows Beach and Mitchell’s 1978 definition as “a set of procedures ‘that the decision maker engages in when attempting to select among alternative courses of action, and a decision rule that dictates how the results of the engaged-in procedures will be used to make the actual decision.’”118 Mintz holds that poliheuristic theory “postulates a two-stage decision process in which the menu for choice is narrowed initially by a noncompensatory analysis that eliminates options by the use of one or more heuristics (cognitive shortcuts). Remaining alternatives are then evaluated in an attempt to minimize risks and maximize benefits.”119 Mintz synthesizes two key findings of the model (i) use of more than one decision rule by leaders to arrive at a decision and (ii) evaluation of gains and losses in political terms, especially domestic politics.120 “The poliheuristic decision-making theory highlights the cognitive mechanisms that mediate foreign policy choices and behavior. The theory incorporates

115 Alex Mintz and Nehemia Geva, “The Poliheuristic Theory of Foreign Policy Decisionmaking.” In Nehemia Geva and Alex Mintz, Eds., Decisionmaking on War and Peace: The Cognitive-rational Debate (Boulder: Lynne Rienner, 1997). 116 Michelle M. Taylor-Robinson and Steven B. Redd, “Framing and the Poliheuristic Theory of Decision: The United Fruit Company and the 1954 U.S.-Led Coup in Guatemala.” In Alex Mintz, Ed., Integrating Cognitive and Rational Theories of Foreign Policy Decision Making (New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2002). 117 Taylor-Robinson and Redd, “Framing and the Poliheuristic Theory of Decision,”

80. 118 Taylor-Robinson and Redd, “Framing and the Poliheuristic Theory of Decision,”

80. 119 Alex Mintz, “How Do Leaders Make Decisions? A Poliheuristic Perspective.” The Journal of Conflict Resolution, Vol. 48, No. 1 (February, 2004): 3. https://doi.org/10. 1177/0022002703261056. 120 Alex Mintz, “Applied Decision Analysis: Utilizing Poliheuristic Theory to Explain and Predict Foreign Policy and National Security Decisions.” International Studies Perspectives, Vol. 6 (2005): 94–95.

48

S. M. MAGU

the conditions surrounding foreign policy decisions as well as the cognitive processes themselves (i.e., the why and how of decisionmaking), thus addressing both the contents and the processes of decisions.”121 Elsewhere, Allison’s argument of the rational, organization and bureaucratic politics as models upon which explanations of decisions should be based is noted. Mintz proposes “combining the cognitive and rational schools to form the poliheuristic decision model.”122 The poliheuristic theory is considered a decision model. The basis of the twostage poliheuristic choice model is “the cognitive psychology school of decision making with elements of the rational choice school,”123 streamlined include only immediately clearly ‘available’ options and information. Limited availability of and full access to information limits options and produces sub-optimal outcomes. Further, state actors often have varying motivations and regularly make spurious decisions. The Cold War demonstrated this, with leaders such as Mobutu who, being pro-west, conflated his survival with the country. Similar strategies manifest elsewhere; for Bush (43’s) White House’s foreign policy decision-making, there was “a tension … in how presidents evaluate information: presidents and other national security-level decision makers want to make the best choices from a policy standpoint. On the other hand, they cannot ignore the political consequences of their decisions.”124 The explanatory power of theories—always a key measure of a theory’s robustness—the poliheuristic theory of choice has a broader decisionmaking coverage range of explanation. The model applies to “single decisions, group decisions, sequential decisions, and decisions in strategic settings.” It focuses on processes and outcomes of decisions, why and how world leaders make decisions.125 Despite its broad explanatory range, it differs from RAM/RCT because “whereas the RAM assumes that all 121 Mintz and Geva, “The Poliheuristic Theory of Foreign Policy Decisionmaking,” 80–81. 122 Alex Mintz and Karl DeRouen Jr., Understanding Foreign Policy Decision Making (New York: Cambridge University Press, 2010), 78. 123 Mintz, “How Do Leaders Make Decisions?” 4. 124 Eben J. Christensen and Steven B. Redd, “Bureaucrats Versus the Ballot Box in

Foreign Policy Decision Making: An Experimental Analysis of the Bureaucratic Politics Model and the Poliheuristic Theory.” The Journal of Conflict Resolution, Vol. 48, No. 1, The Poliheuristic Theory of Foreign Policy Decision Making (2004), 69. 125 Mintz, “How Do Leaders Make Decisions?” 4.

2

CONCEPTUAL APPROACHES TO FOREIGN POLICY …

49

possible options are carefully assessed, Poliheuristic theory suggests that politically unviable options are eliminated out of hand.”126 The question of who makes foreign policy in Africa persists. Can one discern the extent to which foreign policymakers in African countries are familiar with, or bound by these foreign policy decision-making theories? Scholars synthesize how, after eliminating other explanans, leaders prioritize residual options, as the hyperbounded decision-making environment necessitates focusing on a narrow set of policy alternatives and decision dimensions. A two-stage decision process is used, and domestic politics are key consideration in the decision-making. Multiple heuristics are involved, decisions are non-compensatory,127 (they do not take all attributes into account)128 —or “a low utility on the critical dimension cannot be compensated by a higher score on another dimension; […] if an alternative scores an unacceptable low utility on one critical dimension (e.g., the political dimension), that alternative will be eliminated immediately, even if it may have a high score on another dimension (e.g., the military dimension). This indicates that the relationship across various attribute dimensions is nonadditive, non-compensatory.”129 Lastly, most foreign policy decisions are considered in an interactive (strategic) setting, are sequential130 and build on an initial decision, e.g., the Monroe Doctrine. Foreign policy decisions made by African leaders on continental issues show deliberation, but it is unclear if decisions are made in Addis Ababa, daring other African countries and foreign policy-making apparatus to oppose them, as was evident in individual states’ versus AU’s reaction to NATO’s 2011 Libya intervention. Although states are primary actors with invariable preferences, where actors (states) seek to maximize power,

126 Derek Beach, Analyzing Foreign Policy (New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2012), 119. 127 Alex Mintz and Karl DeRouen Jr., Understanding Foreign Policy Decision Making

(New York: Cambridge University Press, 2010), 79–80. 128 Peter Rittgen, “Goal Commitment and Competition as Drivers for Group Produc-

tivity in Business Process Modeling.” In Armin Heinzl, Peter Buxmann, Oliver Wendt and Tim Weitzel, Eds., Theory-Guided Modeling and Empiricism in Information Systems Research (Heidelberg: Physica-Verlag, 2011). 129 Xinsheng Liu, Modeling Bilateral International Relations: The Case of U.S.-China Interactions (New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2011), 31. 130 Mintz and DeRouen Jr., Understanding Foreign Policy Decision Making, 80.

50

S. M. MAGU

security and utilize self-help strategies to secure themselves and their interests, the decisions they make aren’t always based on some set of uniform decision-making strategies, decidedly, not the poliheuristic choice theory. Domestic Audience Costs Although domestic audiences and their role in foreign policy formulation hasn’t quite risen to the level of uncontested theoretical explanation, domestic audiences, i.e., actors exerting influence on elites’ decisionmaking, they exist, they have influence and their contribution is subject to debate. Domestic audience costs are considered “political costs that leaders incur when they back down in a crisis.” There are different types of audience costs; “the side with a stronger domestic audience (e.g., a democracy) is always less likely to back down than the side less able to generate domestic audience costs (a nondemocracy).”131 Domestic audience costs are mostly found in republican states where government persistence can be linked to domestic, and especially foreign policy preferences, but in autocracies they can be expressed by being deposed from leadership. Immanuel Kant’s Perpetual Peace held “that monarchs are more willing to fight each other because they are safely removed from the awful costs. Citizens, on the other hand, are far less likely to take up arms since they would bear the costs themselves.”132 All countries have some version of domestic audiences able to exact some cost, but such costs in autocracies are considered lower than those of democracies.133 Domestic audience costs discussions often brings about the issue of crisis behavior through Fearon’s analysis of a leader’s proclivity to back down during a crisis they precipitate. Leaders can attack, back down or escalate a crisis, but if they back down, they suffer domestic audience

131 Stephen Walt, “Rigor or Rigor Mortis? Rational Choice and Security Studies.” In Michael E. Brown, Owen R. Coté Jr., Sean M. Lynn-Jones and Steven E. Miller, Eds., Rational Choice and Security Studies: Stephen Walt and His Critics, (Cambridge, MA: The MIT Press, 2000), 29. 132 Charles Lipson, Reliable Partners: How Democracies Have Made a Separate Peace (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2003), 18. 133 Michael Tomz, “Democratic Default: Domestic Audiences and Compliance with International Agreements,” Draft manuscript (APSA 2002).

2

CONCEPTUAL APPROACHES TO FOREIGN POLICY …

51

costs—and are considered ineffectual in foreign policy.134 Tomz posits two questions, fundamental to developing theories of domestic audience costs: “would constituents disapprove if their leader made false commitments, and by what means would disapproving citizens hold their leader accountable?”135 The challenge for Africa’s context is the domestic audiences and whether foreign policy decisions constitute a consideration to rewarding or punishing leaders based on foreign policy, assuming elections occur in the first place. Although it hasn’t necessarily been studied, one imagines an inverse relationship between affluence and concern for foreign policy issues, particularly in Africa. As informed as citizens might be, there are questions of how much citizens of African countries know, or care about their countries’ foreign policy preferences. Many do not have access to unfiltered information; even in advanced economies where citizens have greater freedoms, the citizens may not know enough about policies to make rational choices. One cannot forget the 30 percent support by 2016 Republican primary voters of US’ bombing of the fictional kingdom of Agrabah, from the movie Aladdin.136 One expects that in Africa, citizens rarely have (a) access to information, (b) well-researched, non-partisan information and (c) ability to evaluate all possibilities before arriving at an informed position on foreign policy expected of their representatives. Domestic audiences’ policy positions and preferences may be overstated: international agreements are so complex that most voters may best conceive them in terms of personal loss. Such agreements are rarely that simple. Tomz also argues that elections are rarely determined by foreign policy concerns outside of war. Key voting primers and concerns are economic, health, well-being, and rarely, foreign policy. Tomz adds that even well-informed voters may favor positions adopted by leaders even when those hurt them, e.g., US-China trade war which decreased soybeans sales, with a detrimental effect on farm produce prices and jobs if positions are presented as patriotism. Importantly, democracies as a whole 134 Natasha M. Ezrow and Erica Frantz, Dictators and Dictatorships: Understanding

Authoritarian Regimes and Their Leaders (New York: Continuum, 2011), 147–149. 135 Michael Tomz, “Domestic Audience Costs in International Relations: An Experimental Approach.” International Organization, Vol. 61, No. 4 (Autumn, 2007): 823. https://doi.org/10.1017/S0020818307070282. 136 Jana Kasperkevic, “Poll: 30% of GOP Voters Support Bombing Agrabah, the City from Aladdin,” The Guardian (December 18, 2015), n.p.

52

S. M. MAGU

differ in domestic politics, which may be divided between parties; support expressed for foreign policy positions may reflect specific segments and less conflictual issues GATT/WTO rules.137 As Brexit, JCPOA, Paris Climate Agreement and TPP withdrawals showed, perception that states are unitary actors is severely tested, while DPRK’s moves to denuclearize, peace with South Korea and a potential peace agreement did not produce significant dissention. That there are domestic audiences in African countries is without doubt; how much their preferences influence foreign policy is unclear. Foreign policy strategies are not always subject to public debate. Kenya’s 2011 military intervention in Somalia and especially the loss of nearly 300 troops at El Adde in 2017 and the overall goals o KDF’s mission in Somalia remain murky and muted. Somalia and Kenya have had skirmishes, while accusations against Kenya’s treatment of its Somali community make the enterprise touchy. But Kenya is a democracy; domestic audience costs are plausible. However, ethnicity and history, over and above foreign policy or even ideology, are perhaps the most pertinent explanans of foreign (and domestic) policy-making. Without alleging the tiger trap, one expects the same to hold across Africa.

Conclusion Most of the current knowledge, literature, scholarship, mistakes, misconceptions and work on foreign policy-making, decision-making, crises, themes, analyses, prescriptions and exceptions were conceived, raised, grew up, are aging and will retire in Washington and Western Europe. The past 200–500 years show why; it is a slight deviation from Paris, London, Berlin and Rome, yet together these regions account for less than 10% of the world’s population and resources. The current billions are in China, India and Africa. Not even expletive-laden references are likely to change the trajectory of the next century, particularly now that Europe has entered a period of non-violent conflict culture. It is useful to focus on the unknowns of foreign policy in the Global South. Little evidence or scholarship shows applicability of western-derived IR theories to Africa and much of the Global South. Theories explaining 137 Stephanie J. Rickard, “Democratic Differences: Electoral Institutions and Compliance with GATT/WTO Agreements.” European Journal of International Relations, Vol. 16, No. 4 (2010): 711–729.

2

CONCEPTUAL APPROACHES TO FOREIGN POLICY …

53

other political phenomena have many asterisks: democratic politics, constitutional republics, human rights, economic development theories— have not worked in Africa. Western capitalism’s perceived success has still to concede that its foundations of slavery and colonialism, while African socialism and state harmony as the preferred national ideals confound an individualist Judeo-Christian western civilization. African socialism, ubuntu and ujamaa get the communist-socialist label, even though ‘it takes a village to raise a child.’ Outside western, Westphalian states and statehood, scholarship neglects to study and develop theories, analysis and perceptions from the empires (and tomb) of Shin Din or the Great Wall of China as they have with Athens and Sparta, the Delian League and the Peloponnesian Wars. As Brazil, Russia, India and China gain greater visibility as BRICs, one cannot overlook 20% earth’s landmass, 40% of global population, and 70% of the so-called failed states and their future. Regarding Africa, the Rumsfeldian question is useful: What are the known knowns, the known unknowns and the unknown unknowns of foreign policy-making in Africa? Can scholars develop sound, empirical, testable, predictable, parsimonious scholarship on these processes? Absent Africa-based foreign policy analyses, theories and strategies, can other theories of the functionally similar states provide insight into this nascent field? Although the foregoing seems to make a counterintuitive argument regarding western theoretical approaches, here one defaults to the classic INUS condition. We are going to theorize and better understand Africacentric foreign policy decision-making strategies and thus theory if we first consider the most pertinent issues the continent has faced and resolved. This is the task proposed and accomplished by the next several chapters.

References Acharya, Amitav and Barry Buzan. “Why Is There No Non-Western International Relations Theory? An Introduction,” In Non-Western International Relations Theory: Perspectives on and Beyond Asia. Edited by Amitav Acharya and Barry Buzan. London: Routledge, 2010. Aluko, Olajide. “Bureaucratic Politics and Foreign Policy Decision-MaAking in Nigeria.” In Nigerian Foreign Policy: Alternative Perceptions and Projections. Edited by Timothy M. Shaw and Olajide Aluko. London: The Macmillan Press Ltd, 1983. Bach, Tobias and Kai Wegrich. “Blind Spots, Biased Attention, and the Politics of Non-Coordination.” In The Blind Spots of Public Bureaucracy and the Politics

54

S. M. MAGU

of Non-Coordination. Edited by Tobias Bach and Kai Wegrich. Cham: Palgrave Macmillan, 2019. Beach, Derek. Analyzing Foreign Policy. New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2012. Bordens, Kenneth S. and Irwin A. Horowitz. Social Psychology. 2nd ed. New York: Psychology Press, 2012. Breuning, Marijke. Foreign Policy Analysis: A Comparative Introduction. New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2007. Burchill, Scott. “Introduction.” In Theories of International Relations, 2nd ed. Edited by Scott Burchill, Richard Devetak and Andrew Linklater. New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2001. Carlsnaes, Walter. “Foreign Policy.” In Handbook of International Relations. Edited by Walter Carlsnaes, Thomas Risse and Beth A. Simmons. Thousand Oaks: Sage, 2002. Christensen, Eben J. and Steven B. Redd. “Bureaucrats Versus the Ballot Box in Foreign Policy Decision Making: An Experimental Analysis of the Bureaucratic Politics Model and the Poliheuristic Theory.” The Journal of Conflict Resolution, vol. 48, no. 1, The Poliheuristic Theory of Foreign Policy Decision Making (February, 2004): 69–90. https://www.jstor.org/stable/3176269. Cleaves, Peter Shurtleff. Bureaucratic Politics and Administration in Chile. Berkeley: UC Press, 1974. Clifford, J. Garry. “Bureaucratic Politics.” In Explaining the History of American Foreign Relations. 2nd ed. Edited by Michael J. Hogan and Thomas G. Paterson. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2004. Clinton, W. David. The Two Faces of National Interest. Baton Rouge: LSU Press, 1994. Croxton, Derek. “The Peace of Westphalia of 1648 and the Origins of Sovereignty.” The International History Review, vol. 21, no. 3 (1999): 569–592. www.jstor.org/stable/40109077. de Castro, Reuben Herrero. “Foreign Policy and Transatlantic Relations: A Matter of Perceptions, Images, objectives, and Decisions.” In Perceptions and Policy in Transatlantic Relations: Prospective Visions from the US and Europe. Edited by Natividad Fernández Sola and Michael Smith. London: Routledge, 2009. Domhoff, G. William. The Power Elite and the State: How Policy Is Made in America. New York: Aldine de Gruyter, 1990. Elman, Colin and Miriam Fendius Elman. “Introduction: Appraising progress in International Relations Theory.” In Progress in International Relations Theory: Appraising the Field. Edited by Colin Elman and Miriam Fendius Elman. Cambridge, MA: BCSIA, 2003. Eriksson, Lina. Rational Choice Theory: Potential and Limits. New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2011.

2

CONCEPTUAL APPROACHES TO FOREIGN POLICY …

55

Ezrow, Natasha M. and Erica Frantz. Dictators and Dictatorships: Understanding Authoritarian Regimes and Their Leaders. New York: Continuum, 2011. Felter, Claire. “Nigeria’s Battle with Boko Haram.” CFR Backgrounder. Council for Foreign Relations. August 8, 2018. https://www.cfr.org/backgrounder/ nigerias-battle-boko-haram. Frankel, Joseph. National Interest. London: Palgrave Macmillan, 1970. Forsyth, Donelson R. Group Dynamics. Belmont: Cengage, 2009. George, Alexander L. “From Groupthink to Contextual Analysis of PolicyMaking Groups.” In Beyond Groupthink: Political Group Dynamics and Foreign Policy-Making. Edited by Paul ‘t Hart, Eric Stern and Bengt Sundelius. Ann Arbor: UMich Press, 1997. Gerston, Larry N. American Federalism: A Concise Introduction. Armonk, NY: M. E. Sharpe, 2007. Green, Donald and Ian Shapiro. Pathologies of Rational Choice Theory: A Critique of Applications in Political Science. New Haven: Yale, 1994. Gvosdev, Nikolas K., Jessica D. Blankshain and David A. Cooper. DecisionMaking in American Foreign Policy: Translating Theory into Practice. New York: Cambridge, 2019. Haney, Patrick J. Organizing for Foreign Policy Crises: Presidents, Advisers, and the Management of Decision Making. Ann Arbor: The UMich Press, 2002. Hellmann, Gunther and Ursula Stark Urrestarazu. Theories of Foreign Policy. Oxford Bibliographies. (Web). https://doi.org/10.1093/obo/978019974 3292-0104. Holsti, Ole R. “Theories of International Relations.” In Explaining the History of American Foreign Relations, 2nd ed. Edited by Michael J. Hogan, Thomas G. Paterson. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2004. Hudson, Valerie M. Foreign Policy Analysis: Classic and Contemporary Theory, 2nd ed. Lanham: Rowman & Littlefield, 2014. Hudson, Valerie M. “The History and Evolution of Foreign Policy Analysis.” In Foreign Policy: Theories, Actors, Cases, 3rd ed. Edited by Steve Smith, Amelia Hadfield and Timothy Dunne. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2016. Holloway, Steven Kendall. Canadian Foreign Policy: Defining the National Interest. Peterborough: Broadview Press, 2006. Inamete, Ufot Bassey. Foreign Policy Decision-Making in Nigeria. London: Associated University Press, 2001. Jackson, Robert H. and Georg Sørensen. Introduction to International Relations: Theories and Approaches, 5th ed. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2013. Jervis, Robert. Perception and Misperception in International Politics: New Edition. Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2017. Johnson, Janet B. and H. T. Reynolds. Political Science Research Methods, 8th ed. Thousand Oaks: CQ Press, 2015.

56

S. M. MAGU

Kahneman, Daniel and Amos Tversky. “Prospect Theory: An Analysis of Decision Under Risk.” In Handbook of the Fundamentals of Financial Decision Making (World Scientific Handbook in Financial Economics ). Edited by Leonard C. Ziemba and William T. Maclean. Singapore: World Scientific Publishing, 2013. Kettl, Donald F. “Public Bureaucracies.” In The Oxford Handbook of Political Institutions. Edited by R. A. W. Rhodes, Sarah A. Binder and Bert A. Rockman. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2006. Kowert, Paul. Groupthink or Deadlock: When Do Leaders Learn from Their Advisors? Albany: SUNY, 2002. Krasner, Stephen D. Defending the National Interest: Raw Materials Investments and U.S. Foreign Policy. Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1978. Kurki, Milja and Colin Wright. “International Relations and Social Science.” In International Relations Theories, 3rd ed. Edited by Tim Dunne, Milja Kurki and Steve Smith. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2013. Levy, Jack S. “An Introduction to Prospect Theory.” Political Psychology, vol. 13, no. 2, Prospect Theory and Political Psychology (June, 1992): 171–186. https://www.jstor.org/stable/3791677. Levy, Jack S. “Applications of Prospect Theory to Political Science. Synthese, vol. 135, no. 2, Decision Theory (May, 2003): 215–241. https://www.jstor.org/ stable/20117364. Lipson, Charles. Reliable Partners: How Democracies Have Made a Separate Peace. Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2003. Liu, Xinsheng. Modeling Bilateral International Relations: The Case of U.S.China Interactions. New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2011. McDermott, Rose, James H. Fowler and Oleg Smirnov. “On the Evolutionary Origin of Prospect Theory Preferences.” The Journal of Politics, vol. 70, no. 2 (2008): 335–350. https://doi.org/10.1017/s0022381608080341. McDermott, Rose. Risk-Taking in International Politics: Prospect Theory in American Foreign Policy. Ann Arbor: UMich Press, 2001. Milner, Helen V. and Dustin Tingley. Sailing the Water’s Edge: The Domestic Politics of American Foreign Policy. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 2015. Mingst, Karen A. and Ivan M. Arreguín-Toft. Essentials of International Relations, 7th ed. New York: W. W. Norton, 2016. Mintz, Alex. “Applied Decision Analysis: Utilizing Poliheuristic Theory to Explain and Predict Foreign Policy and National Security Decisions.” International Studies Perspectives, vol. 6 (2005): 94–98. https://doi.org/10.1111/j. 1528-3577.2005.00195.x. Mintz, Alex. “How Do Leaders Make Decisions? A Poliheuristic Perspective.” The Journal of Conflict Resolution, vol. 48, no. 1, The Poliheuristic Theory of

2

CONCEPTUAL APPROACHES TO FOREIGN POLICY …

57

Foreign Policy Decision Making (February, 2004): 3–13. https://www.jstor. org/stable/3176265. Mintz, Alex and Amnon Sofrin. “Decision Making Theories in Foreign Policy Analysis.” Oxford Research Encyclopedias (World Politics), October 2017. https://doi.org/10.1093/acrefore/9780190228637.013.405. Mintz, Alex and Karl DeRouen Jr. Understanding Foreign Policy Decision Making. New York: Cambridge University Press, 2010. Mintz, Alex and Nehemia Geva. “The Poliheuristic Theory of Foreign Policy Decisionmaking.” In Decisionmaking on War and Peace: The Cognitiverational Debate. Edited by Nehemia Geva and Alex Mintz. Boulder: Lynne Rienner Publishers, 1997. Morin, Jean-Frédéric and Jonathan Paquin. Foreign Policy Analysis: A Toolbox. Cham: Palgrave Macmillan, 2018. Norwich University. “5 Key Approaches to Foreign Policy Analysis.” Diplomacy. Norwich University Online, 2017. https://online.norwich.edu/academic-pro grams/resources/5-key-approaches-to-foreign-policy-analysis. The National Interest. “Kenya.” The National Interest (Web), December 22, 2018. https://nationalinterest.org/region/africa/east-africa/kenya. O’Grady, Siobhán. “In Nigeria, $2 Billion in Stolen Funds Is Just a Drop in the Corruption Bucket.” Foreign Policy. November 18, 2015 https://foreignpolicy.com/2015/11/18/in-nigeria-2-billion-in-stolenfunds-is-just-a-drop-in-the-corruption-bucket/. Oppenheimer, Joe. Principles of Politics: A Rational Choice Theory Guide to Politics and Social Justice. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2012. Ostrom, Elinor. “A Behavioral Approach to the Rational Choice Theory of Collective Action: Presidential Address, American Political Science Association, 1997.” The American Political Science Review, vol. 92, no. 1 (March, 1998): 1–22. http://www.jstor.org/stable/2585925. Palmer, Glenn and Clifton Morgan. A Theory of Foreign Policy. Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2006. Porter, Gareth. Vietnam: The Politics of Bureaucratic Socialism. Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1994. Republic of Kenya. “Kenya Foreign Policy.” Ministry of Foreign Affairs. November 2015. http://www.mfa.go.ke/wp-content/uploads/2016/09/ Kenya-Foreign-Policy.pdf. Rickard, Stephanie J. “Democratic differences: Electoral Institutions and Compliance with GATT/WTO Agreements.” European Journal of International Relations, vol. 16 no. 4 (December, 2010): 711–729. https://doi.org/10. 1177/1354066109346890. Rittgen, Peter. “Goal Commitment and Competition as Drivers for Group Productivity in Business Process Modeling.” In Theory-Guided Modeling and

58

S. M. MAGU

Empiricism in Information Systems Research. Edited by Armin Heinzl, Peter Buxmann, Oliver Wendt and Tim Weitzel. Heidelberg: Physica-Verlag, 2011. Russett, Bruce, Harvey Starr and David Kinsella. World Politics: The Menu for Choice, 9th ed. Boston: Cengage, 2010. Schafer, Mark and Scott Crichlow. Groupthink Versus High-Quality Decision Making in International Relations. New York: Columbia University Press, 2010. Schultz, David Andrew and James A. Beverly. Encyclopedia of Public Administration and Public Policy. New York: Routledge, 2005. Sharma, Ram Nath and S. S. Chandra. Advanced Industrial Psychology. New Delhi: Atlantic, 2004. Sims, Ronald R. Ethics and Corporate Social Responsibility: Why Giants Fall. Westport: Praeger, 2003. Smith, Steve. “Theories of foreign policy: an historical overview.” Review of International Studies, no. 12 (1986): 13–29. https://www.jstor.org/stable/200 97063. Stein, Arthur A. Why Nations Cooperate: Circumstance and Choice in International Relations. Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1990. Taber, Charles S. “The Interpretation of Foreign Policy Events: A Cognitive Process Theory.” In Problem Representation in Foreign Policy DecisionMaking. Edited by Donald A. Sylvan and James F. Voss. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1998. Tang, Shiping. “The Virtue of Uncertain Advice: Robert Jervis’ Perception and Misperception in International Politics.” In Classics of International Relations: Essays in Criticism and Appreciation. Edited by Henrik Bliddal, Casper Sylvest and Peter Wilson. New York: Routledge, 2013. Taylor-Robinson, Michelle M. and Steven B. Redd. “Framing and the Poliheuristic Theory of Decision: The United Fruit Company and the 1954 U.S.-Led Coup in Guatemala.” In Integrating Cognitive and Rational Theories of Foreign Policy Decision Making. Edited by Alex Mintz. New York: Palgrave Macmillan 2002. Tomz, Michael. “Democratic Default: Domestic Audiences and Compliance with International Agreements.” Draft manuscript (APSA 2002). https://web.sta nford.edu/~tomz/working/apsa02.pdf. Tomz, Michael. “Domestic Audience Costs in International Relations: An Experimental Approach.” International Organization, vol. 61, no. 4 (Autumn, 2007): 821–840. https://www.jstor.org/stable/4498169. Yaqing Qin. “Why Is There No Chinese International Relations Theory?” In Non-Western International Relations Theory: Perspectives on and Beyond Asia. Edited by Amitav Acharya, Barry Buzan. London: Routledge, 2010. Yetiv, Steve A. Explaining Foreign Policy: U.S. Decision-Making and the Persian Gulf War. Baltimore: John Hopkins Press, 2004.

2

CONCEPTUAL APPROACHES TO FOREIGN POLICY …

59

Yetiv, Steve A. Explaining Foreign Policy: U.S. Decision-Making in the Gulf Wars, 2nd ed. Baltimore: John Hopkins, 2011. Walt, Stephen. “Rigor or Rigor Mortis? Rational Choice and Security Studies.” In Rational Choice and Security Studies: Stephen Walt and His Critics. Edited by Michael E. Brown, Owen R. Coté Jr., Sean M. Lynn-Jones, and Steven E. Miller. Cambridge: MIT Press, 2000. Weber, Cynthia. International Relations Theory: A Critical Introduction. London: Routledge, 2001. Zey, Mary. Rational Choice Theory and Organizational Theory: A Critique. London: Sage, 1997.

CHAPTER 3

Politics of Geography, Statehood, Residual Colonization and Territorial Integrity

Introduction This chapter examines some of the immediate, most pressing issues that Africa contended with at the dawn of independence. Because these issues had been largely inherited from the colonial state but spoke to the very existence of the new African state, it was necessary, even imperative, to resolve the contours of statehood, the issue of borders (the OAU decided to retain colonial boundaries), the outline of a continental union (especially the consensus on a loose or other format of a continental federation) that would work toward continental unification, and the place of regional economic communities and organizations. It aggregates the three most pertinent ideas and regional groupings, their positions on African Unity and the (role and location) of Ethiopia as OAU headquarters; to wit, it discusses the Brazzaville Group, the Casablanca Group and the Monrovia group, and also highlights the role of regional economic communities and whether or not they supported or inhibited continental unity. The chapter discusses the tension between absolute twin principles of sovereignty and non-intervention in the internal affairs of members, and the effortless OAU position of forming the African Liberation Committee (ALC) to support freedom movements especially in Rhodesia and South Africa, and the concept of NIBMAR—no independence before majority African rule in the region.

© The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2021 S. M. Magu, Explaining Foreign Policy in Post-Colonial Africa, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-62930-4_3

61

62

S. M. MAGU

This chapter investigates conditions in several African countries after independence, decisions instrumental in deciding several issues pertinent to Africa, and the formation of the Organization of African Unity. Such issues included finalizing nations’ borders, affirming long-standing principles of international norms—sovereignty, non-interference in internal affairs, residual colonial control, economic development and IGOs’ role in helping Africa develop. Given the ongoing Cold War, non-alignment and collaboration with NAM and G77 were important; tackling neocolonialism, colonial institutions, practices and economic dependence were also addressed. Reaching consensus was difficult particularly given ethnic fractionalization and distribution of ethnic groups across interstate borders, exacerbated by colonialism. Groups that had cooperated with colonialists were bearing the brunt of the wrath of the new dispensation, and some pointed to their particular suffering under colonialism. Where these conflicts lingered, conflicts were starting to take on genocidal proportions, and would linger into the examples of the 1994 Rwanda genocide. African foreign policy decision(s) and consensus borders would be only one of the issues facing the continent—apartheid and Ian Smith’s UDI would be some of the others. The deceptions, invasions, collaborations and duplicitous circumstances, outgrowths of the 1885 Berlin Conference that carved Africa’s territorial pie is well-known. Two “areas” were free of colonial rule. Italy sought to expand colonialism beyond Eritrea to Ethiopia, producing two copies of the Treaty of Wuchale (Wichale) (or Treaty of Ucciali (Italian)) in both Amharic and Italian languages, and which were signed by Menelik II the Negus of Showa, Menelik (II), the Elect of God, Conquering Lion of the Tribe of Judah, King of Kings of Ethiopia1 as the rightful Emperor of Abyssinia2 and Italian representatives on the other. Still, in a preview of the interventions that would precede and follow Africa’s independence, Italy supplied Menelik’s rival, Ras Mengesha of Tigray with weapons to contest Menelik’s rule. The Wichale / Ucciali model was repeated across Africa before, during colonialism and after independence. The Italian version of the treaty made Ethiopia an Italian protectorate.3 In due time, Menelik discovered that 1 Theodore M. Vestal, “Reflections on the Battle of Adwa and Its Significance for Today.” In Paulos Milkias and Getachew Metaferia, Eds., The Battle of Adwa: Reflections on Ethiopia’s Historic Victory Against European Imperialism (New York: Algora, 2005). 2 Saheed A. Adejumobi, The History of Ethiopia (Westport: Greenwood Press, 2007). 3 Vestal, “Reflections on the Battle of Adwa”, 2005.

3

POLITICS OF GEOGRAPHY, STATEHOOD …

63

“the treaty that he signed in both Italian and Amharic contained differing clauses relating to the disposition of diplomatic relations between two states.”4 The Italian version “claimed that Abyssinia was obliged to go through Italy in its foreign relations. Ethiopia had been duped into becoming a protectorate of the Italian nation.”5 Alleging Ethiopia was Italy’s sphere of influence served Italy well; the British “recognized the whole of Ethiopia as a sphere of Italian interest.”6 There would be few wins the like of the 100,000-strong Ethiopian Battle of Adwa in 1896, which postponed Ethiopia’s European encroachment until 1935. Ethiopia’s role in Africa is important, not only as demonstrative of the resistance but also to illustrate the folly of European-signed treaties and their impact on Africa. They included the 1897 Anglo-Ethiopian treaty, the 1899 and 1907 Hague Conventions of 1899 and 1907, the Geneva Convention for the ICRC,7 the 1928 Italo–Ethiopian Treaty of Friendship and Arbitration (Mussolini’s subjugation attempt) and the Covenant of the League of Nations (the Union of South Africa and Liberia were invited). The bilateral treaties reserved private conniption to create backdoors to allege Ethiopia’s violations to justify occupation. Liberia also signed and ratified several treaties, e.g., the Hague Conventions of 1899 and 1907, as other African regions were being invaded and colonized. European pre- and colonial activities in Africa produced major challenges as the soon-to-be sovereign states contemplated membership conditions in the international society of the Westphalian state. Treaties not entered into voluntarily or by sovereign states were binding, and the extent to which African nations ought to have kept fidelity to them was open to question. One non-state entity with tragic outcomes was the Nandi community, led by a charismatic, spiritual-political orkoiyot , Koitalel arap Samoei, properly suspicious of the ‘pale strangers.’ In honoring a meeting with Col. Richard Meinertzhagen to discuss peace, “claiming that Koitalel was plotting an ambush, the British officer brazenly shot the orkoiyot to death when the two leaders met to shake hands. Meinertzhagen’s men then opened fire and killed twenty-three 4 Adejumobi, The History of Ethiopia, 29. 5 Adejumobi, The History of Ethiopia, 29, and Vestal, “Reflections on the Battle of

Adwa”, 24. 6 Vestal, “Reflections on the Battle of Adwa”, 25. 7 International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC), “Treaties, States Parties and

Commentaries: Ethiopia - Historical Documents”, n.d. (Web).

64

S. M. MAGU

more members of Koitalel’s entourage.”8 Meinertzhagen claimed he was ridding the Nandi a ‘troublesome’ leader; he did not apprehend Kant’s entreaty to avoid assassins (percussores ) or poisoners (venefici) in diplomacy. Further south, General Lothar von Trotha applied more egregious massacre strategies that previewed future genocidal outcomes. “I believe that the nation as such should be annihilated, or, if this was not possible by tactical measures, they have to be expelled from the country by operative means and further detailed treatment.”9 African societies, nations, chieftains, kingdoms all, were recognizing that there was no amity, partnership or free trade: Europeans saw terra nullius and now owned them. These were successful tools of initial control; later, divideand-rule was used despite superior weapons, pivoting to stakeholder approaches in controlling, per Kipling, their ‘sullen half-savage, half-children.’ “When possible, Europeans achieved conquest peacefully through deceptive treaties, bribes, division of states and attempts to convince leaders that resistance was futile.”10 Belmessous adds that “the history of treaty making, with its stories of fraudulence, unfairness and a violation of indigenous entitlements, shows that the aspiration to legitimacy frequently remained precisely that: an aspiration. Fraudulent treaties also showed that forms of consent could hide imposed authority.”11 At the 1945 ratification of the charter of the United Nations in 1945, four African countries were present: Egypt, Ethiopia, Liberia and the Union of South Africa. As colonies, other African nations could not, and did not attend. Ethiopia, which successfully beat back Italian expansionism from 1935 to 1945, was a signatory to several global conventions. The burden of anti-colonial advocacy fell to Ghana’s fired-up, panAfricanist Kwame Nkrumah. During his Independence Day speech on

8 Timothy Parsons, The Rule of Empires: Those Who Built Them, Those Who Endured Them, and Why They Always Fall (New York: Oxford, 2010), 292. 9 Veena Das, “Collective Violence and the Shifting Categories of Communal Riots, Ethnic Cleansing and Genocide.” In Dan Stone, Ed., The Historiography of Genocide (New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2008), 114. 10 Craig A. Lockard, Societies, Networks, and Transitions: A Global History. 3rd ed. (Stamford: Cengage, 2015), 503. 11 Saliha Belmessous, “The Paradox of Empire by Treaty.” In Saliha Belmessous, Ed., Empire by Treaty: Negotiating European Expansion, 1600–1900 (New York: Oxford University Press, 2015), 12.

3

POLITICS OF GEOGRAPHY, STATEHOOD …

65

March 6th, 1957, besides extolling the hard work and long struggle of Ghanaians, he stated that “our independence is meaningless unless it is linked up with the total liberation of Africa.”12 In due course, he would continue to raise issues of decolonization at the UN, against European powers that purported to advocate for democracy while still holding colonies. More challenging would be the fulfillment of his vision of a federated Africa, and the fate of colonial borders. The Philosophy of Continental Union and the Politics of Geography Almost uniformly, African leaders who led their countries to liberation spent part of their lives in the capitals of the very colonial empires they were attempting to dismantle. Consequently, early African foreign policy was designed by a mix of these leaders, residual colonial bureaucrats, foreign influences particularly in the context of the Cold War, and in some overt instances, by the very African leaders who were in the grip of the colonial powers. Pan-Africanist ideas, initially driven by the pan-African Congresses and the struggle for African peoples oppressed globally and supplanted by the Universal Negro Improvement Association in the 1920s13 looked more African and the disagreements were between federation or association. The OAU was ultimately a hybrid: sovereign states with a goal of future federation. Over time with the end of the Cold War, the OAU saw the wisdom of Regional Economic Communities even though they often reignited old schisms. Despite the abortive efforts of would-be-king Gaddafi, the OAU became the AU with pre-independent global pan-Africanist ambitions dimmed. Ghana became independent in a sea of colonialism, besides Libya, Egypt (oriented toward the Arab League) and a decidedly hostile South Africa. In 1960, the next 15 countries gained independence, mostly in West Africa. Nkrumah’s vision of a federated Africa persisted and together with Guinea, promulgated an amalgamation of former British, Italian colonies plus others, with Nigeria joining in 1960. This was the Casablanca Group whose goal for a federated Africa promised a “panacea

12 Godfrey Mwakikagile, Africa After Independence: Realities of Nationhood with Photos (Dar: New Africa, 2009), 56. 13 Patrick Manning, The African Diaspora: A History Through Culture (New York: Columbia University Press, 2009).

66

S. M. MAGU

for African balkanisation and underdevelopment.”14 Counter-arguments favoring functional regional cooperation were persuasive, but Nkrumah maintained that “the idea of regional federation in Africa is fraught with many dangers. There is the danger of development of regional royalties, fighting against each other. In effect, regional federations are a form of balkanisation on a grand scale.”15 His perspective on continental unity was hopeful, but impractical: ethnic, cultural and colonial-era divisions would entrench and persist. Ivory Coast’s Felix Houphouet-Boigny was prominent in the Monrovia Group which preferred a looser federation, a la OAU.16 Houphouet-Boigny was particularly uncompromising, challenging continental unity– or anything non-French. He was disruptive, and “so subservient to France that even years after his country won independence, he refused to attend meetings of the [OAU], claiming that he was afraid of flying. Yet he did not show any fear when he flew to Paris every year.”17 A less disruptive proponent of the looser federation approach was Senegal’s Leopold Sedar Senghor. Aghrout recounts Senghor’s argument: “African unity should not be an immediate objective but should begin with regional unions such as North Africa, West Africa, and East Africa linked by an organisation of African and Malagasy States.”18 Today, this approach is promising. The third approach was promoted by the Brazzaville Group. “The Brazzaville Group comprised of 12 French-speaking states that first met in Abidjan, Cote d’Ivoire (Ivory Coast), in October 1960: Benin (formerly Dahomey), Burkina Faso (formerly Upper Volta), Cameroon, Central African Republic, Chad, Congo (Brazzaville), Cote d’Ivoire, Gabon, Madagascar (formerly Malagasy Republic), Mauritania, Niger, and Senegal.”19 Their position was decidedly anti-African, supporting 14 Ahmed Aghrout, “Africa’s Experiences with Regional Co-Operation and Integration: Assessing some Groupings”, vol. 47, no. 4 (1992): 566. https://www.jstor.org/stable/ 40760734. 15 Kwame Nkrumah, Africa Must Unite (London: Heineman Educational Books Ltd., 1963), 214–215. 16 Manning, The African Diaspora, 2009. 17 Mwakikagile, Africa After Independence, 56. 18 Aghrout, “Africa’s Experiences with Regional Co-Operation and Integration”, 567. 19 Samuel M. Makinda and F. Wafula Okumu, The African Union: Challenges of

Globalization, Security, and Governance (New York: Routledge, 2007), 21.

3

POLITICS OF GEOGRAPHY, STATEHOOD …

67

French and De Gaulle’s vision of imperial redemption. “The Brazzaville Group sided with France on the Algerian conflict, opposed communist intrusions into Africa, and vowed to remain on the on the best of terms with France,”20 never mind that France aimed to recolonize Algeria. Makinda and Okumu demonstrate the feint by this group—the impression that they favored continental unity based on economic, rather than political pathways. The first meeting of this pro-French Empire convened to mediate the French-Algerian war. It ended in acrimony and boycotts, a Guinean denunciation and Togo’s abstention. African unity was attracting iterations, language groups, nationalistic causes, colonial experiences and residual relationships with former colonizers. If they could not agree on the federation structure, how would they address other more important questions, including colonialism, Kenya Colony and southern Rhodesia, apartheid in South Africa, and Portuguese colonies? How were they going to address the issue of economic development, representation, membership of international bodies such as the Bretton Woods Institutions and the United Nations Security Council? Wallerstein attributes the split between the Brazzaville group (Union Africaine et Malgache, UAM ) and the Casablanca group to their positions on three major issues at the UN. First, regarding the faction representing Congo’s legitimate government after the 1960 putsch; the level of support for Algeria’s Provisional Government; and admission of Mauritania to the United Nations.21 The All-African Peoples Conference “became increasingly identified with the Casablanca group and held its last meeting in Cairo in 1961”22 while the 1962 meeting was not held due to poor relations with the other independent countries. It was an inauspicious start to continental unity efforts, although other regional blocs with consensus positions especially on southern Africa arose, to continue pursuit of independence and pan-African unity. Initial efforts toward Africa’s regional cooperation boiled down to either regionalism with functional cooperation as building blocks of a

20 Makinda and Okumu, The African Union, 21. 21 Immanuel Wallerstein, “The Role of the Organization of African Unity in Contem-

porary African Politics.” In Yassin El-Ayouty and H.C. Brooks, Eds., Africa and International Organization (Hague: Martinus Nijhoff, 1974). 22 Wallerstein, “The Role of the Organization of African Unity”, 19.

68

S. M. MAGU

federation, or continental, economic integration first and later, political integration. “The OAU was viewed as a way of proceeding on two fronts – on a pan-African basis and sub-regionally – covering political and economic cooperation.”23 Other ideas abounded: the UN Economic Commission for Africa (UNECA) favored a “developmental approach,” while the OAU proposed “co-operation-integration” of markets, removal of trade barriers and promotion of joint investments. Parallel to the progressive integration, the Africa Economic Community (AEC) was founded in 1991 while moribund and colonial-era regional customs and economic associations found new life. Consensus: Founding the Organization of African Unity (OAU) The ‘butterfly effect’ informs some of the ways that small, unrelated events have impacts, although fractures between Casablanca, Monrovia and Brazzaville groups were influenced by leaders and events elsewhere, including Asia. The path to OAU went through pan-Africanist congresses, global summits, meetings, like-minded activities and leaders. The 1955 Afro-Asian Conference (or The Bandung Conference) was held in Bandung, Indonesia and brought together 29 “non-aligned” countries (and colonies) from Africa, Asia and the Middle East. They represented about 1.5 billion people (~ 54% of earth’s population), and laid the foundation for the 1961 establishment of the Non-Aligned Movement (NAM). The six African countries were: Republic of Egypt, Ethiopian Empire, and Republic of the Sudan, Liberia, Kingdom of Libya and Colony of the Gold Coast. The conference discussed principles and declarations including the China–India Panchsheel Treaty (Five Principles of Peaceful Coexistence) as a blueprint for the conference’s future.24 Other outcomes besides the Panchsheel Treaty included Nehru’s ardent advocacy for African liberation and a suspicion by the US that the meeting was somehow a 23 Aghrout, “Africa’s Experiences with Regional Co-Operation and Integration”, 567. 24 This treaty expressed mutual respect for territorial integrity and sovereignty, non-

aggression, non-interference in internal affairs, equality, cooperation and peaceful coexistence. Still, China and India fought several wars and skirmishes from 1963 (Tarun Khanna, Billions of Entrepreneurs: How China and India Are Reshaping Their Futures and Yours [Boston: Harvard, 2007]); United Nations, Treaty Series Treaties and International Agreements Registered or Filed and Recorded with the Secretariat of the United Nations, vol. 299 (1958): 4303–4325.

3

POLITICS OF GEOGRAPHY, STATEHOOD …

69

communist gathering. The conference, besides being “the largest of its kind,” was more “the embrace and use of the international conference format [which] must not be interpreted as derivative, but as a vital revision of form and purpose for a new global order.”25 Host Sukarno stated that, “we can mobilise all the spiritual, all the moral, all the political strength of Asia and Africa on the side of peace […] we can mobilise what I have called the Moral Violence of Nations in favour of peace. […] the Bandung meeting introduced, legitimated, and entrenched recognized heads of state.”26 Delegates decried “colonialism in all of its manifestations” but soon, Indonesia embarked on Konfrontasi, invading Malaysia and East Timor. Nasser’s stature was elevated by the Suez Crisis, his interest and activism pivoted to Arab affairs, particularly with the United Arab Republic / Syria debacle. Personal aggrandizement for African leaders was also an issue. Nasser’s Suez Crisis limelight, despite the wholly American-inspired solution, allowed him to claim resisting ‘anti-Arab imperialists.’ The US-USSR Cold War concerns that fixed the Suez Crisis forcing Britain, Israel and French troops’ withdrawal continued declination of European colonial empires (Dutch in Indonesia, 1947 and France in Indochina, 1954). Suez was sustained imperial disgrace: troops disembarking at Dover Marine were (shouted at by boys and) asked, “Did you get kicked out, then?”27 Egypt’s sovereignty was reaffirmed, the Global South was assertive and Nehru was outspoken at the UN, against British and French intervention and the US/UN affirmed Egypt’s sovereignty. Nasser then founded the Afro-Asian Peoples’ Solidarity Organization (AAPSO) late in 1957,28 expanding it to involve states, cultural exchanges, women and youth taking part in conferences in Guinea, Ghana and Tanzania. Its 1966 expansion to Havana, “with the 1966 founding of the Afro-Asian Latin

25 Christopher J. Lee, “The Rise of Third World Diplomacy: Success and Its Meanings at the 1955 Asian-African Conference in Bandung, Indonesia.” In Robert Hutchings and Jeremi Suri, Eds., Foreign Policy Breakthroughs: Cases in Successful Diplomacy (New York: Oxford University Press, 2015), 57. 26 Lee, “The Rise of Third World Diplomacy”, 59. 27 Martin Woollacott and Angela Woollacott, After Suez: Adrift in the American

Century (London: I.B. Tauris & Co., Ltd., 2005), 23. 28 Lee, “The Rise of Third World Diplomacy”, 2015.

70

S. M. MAGU

American People’s Solidarity Organization,”29 gave it decidedly socialist leanings.30 These events predated 1957, and even as liberation began, African states experienced immediate, critical challenges, captured by Kenya’s 1st president: “kuondoa umaskini, ugonjwa na ujinga”31 —‘fighting poverty, disease and ignorance.’ Regionally, in 1958, Nkrumah proposed a “Union of West African Socialist Republics”32 and also convened the 1st Conference of Independent African States (CIAS) with Egypt, Ghana, Sudan, Libya, Tunisia, Liberia, Morocco and Ethiopia attending. In December 1958, “an All-African People’s Conference held in Accra was attended by delegates from 62 African nationalist organizations.”33 In 1959, the AllAfrican Trade Union Federation met while in 1960, the Ghana-Guinea Union was formed, a precursor to “The Union of African States” and “the nucleus of the ‘United States of Africa.’”34 African countries were becoming wary of Nkrumah‘s designs and speed, but he argued in 1960 that Ghana was just a foundation: “the Union of Africa should be striven for by every lawful means.”35 Ghana’s one-year anniversary brought together major African figures: Tom Mboya and Joseph Murumbi (Kenya Colony), Nnamdi Azikiwe (Nigeria), Apithy, Garba-Jahumpa (Gambia), Djibo Bakary (Niger) and Mwalimu Julius Nyerere (Tanganyika Territory/Tanzania).36 After the celebrations, many attendees took part in the Conference of Independent African States (CIAS).37 The participants were Ghana (host), Libya, Ethiopia, Morocco, Sudan and the United Arab Republic.38 Alongside 29 Lee, “The Rise of Third World Diplomacy”, (2015), 66. 30 Lee, “The Rise of Third World Diplomacy”, 2015. 31 Republic of Kenya, The Kenya National Assembly Official Record (Hansard) (October

9, 2002), 2394. 32 Eric S. Packham, Africa in War and Peace (New York: Nova Science Publishers, Inc., 2004), 171. 33 Packham, Africa in War and Peace, 171. 34 Packham, Africa in War and Peace, 171. 35 Packham, Africa in War and Peace, 171. 36 Willard Scott Thompson, Ghana’s Foreign Policy, 1957 –1966: Diplomacy Ideology,

and the New State (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1969). 37 Daryl Zizwe Poe, Kwame Nkrumah’s Contribution to Pan-African Agency: An Afrocentric Analysis (New York: Routledge, 2003). 38 Poe, Kwame Nkrumah’s Contribution to Pan-African Agency, 2003.

3

POLITICS OF GEOGRAPHY, STATEHOOD …

71

the All-African Peoples Conferences (AAPC), CIAS was critical to OAU’s establishment given issues it tackled. It was an “exchange of views on foreign policy, especially in relation to the African continent; the future of African dependent territories; the Algerian problem; the racial problem; steps taken to safeguard the independence, sovereignty, and territorial integrity of the independent African states.”39 The fifth point was the “establishment, after the conference, of permanent machinery for consultation on foreign policy”40 CIAS lacked structure, organizational ability, or a path to a continental unity and by 1962 it fizzled.41 Early, consistent attempts at continental unity were in West Africa; the countries were first to gain independence. In East Africa, Somalia was still divided between the French, Italians and British; Tanganyika, a hold-over Mandate Territory from Versailles became independent in 1961, Uganda in 1962 and Kenya colony in 1963. But here, colonial-era EACSO and PAFMECA were alive, the latter advocating for liberation of Kenya, Nyasaland, Tanganyika, Uganda and Zanzibar with future EAC possibilities.42 The 1959 PAFMECA Moshi conference included Belgian Congo, Kenya, Tanganyika, Uganda and Zanzibar representatives. Its proposals included boycotts of apartheid South Africa, opposing French nuclear weapons tests in the Sahara and better representation for Asians in these countries. Its next meeting was held in 1962 in Addis Ababa; Ethiopia and Somalia joined, while parties in Namibia, Southwest Africa, Basutoland, Bechuanaland and Swaziland were invited, transforming it into the pan-African Freedom Movement of East, Central, and South Africa (PAFMECSA).43

39 Michael O. Anda, International Relations in Contemporary Africa (Lanham: University Press of America, 2000), 86. 40 Anda, International Relations in Contemporary Africa, 86. 41 Immanuel Wallerstein, “The Role of the Organization of African Unity in Contem-

porary African Politics.” In Yassin El-Ayouty and H.C. Brooks, Eds., Africa and International Organization (Hague: Martinus Nijhoff, 1974). 42 ____, “Pan-African Freedom Movement of East and Central Africa (PAFMECA).” International Organization, vol. 16, no. 2, Africa and International Organization (Spring, 1962): 446. 43 ____, “Pan-African Freedom Movement,” 1962.

72

S. M. MAGU

OAU = Continental Unity: (Maybe) African states’ foreign policy positions and preferences were becoming clearer even as the distance between the countries, regions, blocs and leaders oscillated. The structures they built would influence success if decolonization was to be achieved. A May 1963 meeting of 30 African foreign ministers took place in Addis Ababa to prepare the agenda for a meeting of African heads of states.44 Its agenda grew out Monrovia Group and UAM/AMU-Brazzaville Groups’ efforts at consensus. “The Foreign Minister of Ethiopia attended the Brazzaville meetings as well. In order to bridge the gaps, the Foreign Minister of Ethiopia advised the Ethiopian emperor to convene a summit of the African states at Addis Ababa at which they should iron out their differences and adopt an African unity approach,”45 hence the Ministers’ meeting. The second purpose of the Ministerial meeting was to synthesize and prepare an “agreed text based upon the Lagos Charter, the Casablanca Charter and the Ethiopian Draft Charter, which was in substance the same as the Lagos Charter.”46 The charter of the Organization of African Unity was signed in Addis Ababa on May 25th, 1963 by 30 heads of state (Chad and Togo signed later as founding members).47 It was a “compromise between a strong federal type of structure that the Casablanca Group favoured and a looser association of states favoured by the Monrovia group; a political compromise between the BrazzavilleMonrovia forces on the one hand and the Casablanca powers on the other.”48 The agreement benefitted from the resolution of the Congo crisis. The “compromise was that the Casablanca powers accepted the Monrovia formula – a loose, confederal structure for the OAU and a pledge of non-interference in each other’s internal politics – in return for which the OAU was pledged to give high priority to the goal of

44 Guy Arnold, Guide to African Political and Economic Development (London: Fitzroy Dearborn Publishers, 2001). 45 Daniel Don Nanjira, African Foreign Policy and Diplomacy from Antiquity to the 21st Century, Vol. 1. (Santa Barbara: Praeger, 2010), 148. 46 Humayun Akhter Kamal, “Organization of African Unity”, Pakistan Horizon, vol. 26, no. 1 (First Quarter, 1973): 37. https://www.jstor.org/stable/41393158. 47 Arnold, Guide to African Political and Economic Development, 6. 48 Wallerstein, “The Role of the Organization of African Unity in Contemporary African

Politics”, 20.

3

POLITICS OF GEOGRAPHY, STATEHOOD …

73

the liberation of southern Africa by political and military aid to liberation movements,”49 creating the African Liberation Committee (ALC); it took over the PAFMECSA building in Dar. The OAU’s structure was weak and “based upon the principles of economic, cultural, scientific and technical co-operation among its members.”50 It had two principal organs; the Council of Ministers (Foreign Affairs ministers, meeting twice a year or during extraordinary or special sessions), and the Assembly of Heads of States and Governments (countries’ leaders). An Assembly Chairman was elected for a one-year term. It had a General Secretariat, a Secretary appointed by the Assembly, the Commission of Mediation, Conciliation and Arbitration, an African Commission on Human and Peoples’ Rights, and the African Court on Human and Peoples’ Right (2002 onwards). From 1994 until 2002’s transition into the African Union (AU), the OAU and the African Economic Commission (AEC, based on the Abuja Treaty and future common market) were two self-reinforcing organization. The OAU charter outlined its purposes in Article II: a) to promote the unity and solidarity of the African States; (b) to coordinate and intensify their cooperation and efforts to achieve a better life for the peoples of Africa; (c) to defend their sovereignty, their territorial integrity and independence; (d) to eradicate all forms of colonialism from Africa; and (e) to promote international cooperation, having due regard to the Charter of the United Nations and the Universal Declaration of Human Rights.51

From inception, the OAU’s proposed activities were mostly foreign policy and externalities: interstate relations, relations with especially Asia, Europe and its remaining colonies. They faced a US morbidly fearful of socialism taking hold, given USSR’s Africa-attracting socialism. USSR’s support for Africa was not benign, but US’ wounds were self-inflicted wounds: alliance with Europe – Africa’s colonizers, lukewarm support for

49 Wallerstein, “The Role of the Organization of African Unity in Contemporary African Politics”, 20. 50 T. O. Elias, “The Charter of the Organization of African Unity.” American. Journal of. International Law, vol. 59, no. 2 (April 1965): 243. 51 African Union, OAU Charter (Web). n.d. https://au.int/sites/default/files/treaties/ 7759-file-oau_charter_1963.pdf.

74

S. M. MAGU

African decolonization, the second-class status of African Americans and discriminatory immigration laws excluding African immigrants from the US. New Statehood, Non-statehood, New Strategy and New Muscle The first meeting of and that adopted the OAU Charter illustrated its future direction In its first resolution, the meeting focused on the inalienable rights articulated in 1948 Universal Declaration of Human Rights (UDHR).52 Although major European powers signed onto the UDHR perhaps to stick it to the USSR, now Africa weaponized it, arguing that “the forcible imposition by the colonial powers of settler-controlled governments was a flagrant violation of the inalienable rights of the legitimate inhabitants of dependent territories.”53 The OAU called upon the colonial powers to comply with UNGA’s Declaration on the Granting of Independence to Colonial Countries and Peoples (UNGA Resolution 1514 (XV)), adopted December 14,1960.54 Despite predating the OAU, the voting was telling: 89 countries voted in favor, none against, and nine abstained: Australia, Belgium, Dominican Republic, France, Portugal, Spain, South Africa, the UK and the US. Other than Australia, Dominican Republic and the US, the others were then colonial powers. Other elements included non-transference of colonies to other countries and restated support for African nationalists in Southern Rhodesia. It declared “that if power in Southern Rhodesia were to be usurped by

52 The UN adoption of the Declaration on the Granting of Independence to Colonial Countries and Peoples was a major step. It had USSR and PRC’s support, and new Asian countries recently met in Bandung. Per to Burke, “during the drafting of the Universal Declaration, efforts to include self-determination in the final text were rejected by the then preponderant Western group, and dismissed outright by influential members of the human rights program” (Roland Burke, Decolonization and the Evolution of International Human Rights [Philadelphia: UPenn Press, 2010]), 38. Even the proponents of the UDHR challenged the idea that self-determination constituted human rights. 53 ———, “Organization of African Unity.” International Organization, vol. 17, no. 4 (Autumn, 1963): 989. https://www.jstor.org/stable/2705119. Accessed: 09-03-2019 01:12 UTC. 54 United Nations, “United Nations and Decolonization.” Main Documents—Declaration on the Granting of Independence to Colonial Countries and Peoples. United Nations. (Web). Accessed on March 9, 2019 from http://www.un.org/en/decolonization/declar ation.shtml.

3

POLITICS OF GEOGRAPHY, STATEHOOD …

75

a racial white minority government, the states’ members of the organization would lend their effective moral and practical support to any legitimate measures which the African nationalist leaders might devise for the purpose of recovering such power and restoring it to the African majority”55 including demands to break “off of diplomatic and consular relations between all African states and the governments of Portugal and South Africa.”56 It gave notice to “allies of colonial powers” to choose supporting Africans and promoted a substantive trade boycott against Portugal and South Africa. This entailed import of goods, closure of ports and airports, denial of overflight and funding liberation movements and technical assistance. Other foreign policy positions the OAU would take were previewed in the charter; some reflected existing documents, e.g., the UN Charter. Item 1 of Article 3 on sovereign equality of all member states reflects paragraph 1, article 2 of the UN Charter, providing “that the United Nations Organization (UNO), ‘is based on the principle of the sovereign equality of all its members.’”57 Their territorial integrity, right to exist and sovereignty, peaceful dispute settlement, mediation, negotiation, conciliation and arbitration, condemning political assassinations and subversion in neighboring states, a dedication to emancipating all African countries and polit”ical non-alignment to any the existing blocs formed the other parts of the OAU charter.58 Higher Purpose: Absolute Sovereignty Versus Non-interference As important as sovereignty and non-interference was, a dissonance emerged: African nations were dedicated to the end of colonialism and decolonization by any means necessary, including supporting liberation movements in the southern African nations, even if it violated sovereignty. Perhaps this stemmed from the perception of illegitimacy of colonialism, apartheid and Ian Smith’s UDI. OAU’s first meeting in 1963 meeting authorized the African Liberation Committee, defined as “an organ of

55 ———, “International Organization”, 989. 56 ———, “International Organization”, 989. 57 Kamal, “Organization of African Unity”, 39. 58 Kamal, “Organization of African Unity”, 1973; paraphrased from the UN Charter, Article 3.

76

S. M. MAGU

the OAU that is designed to serve the objective of African liberation”59 ; the OAU signaled dedication of energies, and use of diplomatic and subversive tools to support liberation. Tellingly, Yousuf adds that the ALC’s formation and work was a reflection of the broader compromise between the revolutionary and more functional approach to the views regarding Africa; ALC’s “preamble stated that in the case of those colonial territories where the colonial power had accepted the principle of independence, and had shown manifest signs of pursuing this goal, members of the committee and the colonial powers concerned should use their good offices to hasten the achievement of representative government and independence by peaceful and constitutional means.”60 The ALC still reserved to itself the option to seek, and use “all means at its disposal to help in the achievement of independence.”61 Indeed, the continent would witness different strategies pursued by liberation fronts: in some cases, it was outright armed conflict, whereas in some colonies, a more pacific, negotiation-based pursuit of liberation was undertaken. Through all this, it was the task of the ALC to determine how to allocate the funds, sometimes in the face of the skepticism of some of the member and contributor countries, and sometimes, disagreement over strategies and approaches. The ALC started with nine countries, expanding to eleven; these included Ethiopia, Guinea, Nigeria, Senegal, Tanzania, Uganda, Algeria, Congo (Kinshasa), Egypt, Somalia, and Zambia.62 African Liberation Committee: Funding Allocation Mechanisms The mechanisms employed by the ALC were primarily of two varieties: diplomacy, and support for armed conflict. As a number of scholars have noted, the formation of the African Union and the African Liberation Committee occurred in an almost intermediate period: during a time when liberation movements had gained some experience fighting for liberation, in the countries where independence followed armed conflict—for example in Kenya, the Mau Mau had waged war against the British 59 Yousuf, Hilmi S., “The OAU and the African Liberation Movement”, Pakistan Horizon, vol. 38, no. 4 (Fourth Quarter 1985): 55–67. https://www.jstor.org/stable/ 41394216. Accessed September 3, 2019 11:46 UTC. 60 Yousuf, “The OAU and the African Liberation Movement”, 56. 61 Yousuf, “The OAU and the African Liberation Movement”, 56 62 Yousuf, Hilmi S., “The OAU and the African Liberation Movement”, 1985.

3

POLITICS OF GEOGRAPHY, STATEHOOD …

77

between 1952 and 1959, while in South Africa, the ANC was beginning to become more assertive in non-pacific ways, with the founding of the armed wing of the ANC, Umkhonto we Sizwe (“Spear of the Nation”), in 1961, after the Sharpeville Massacre. At the same time, some countries achieved independence without armed struggle, particularly in the more central and West African regions. Additionally, as more countries became independent compared to the start of the push for liberation, there were fewer places to direct resources to. Simultaneously, raising funds to support the liberation efforts was not always easy, given the multiplicity of factors such as resource deficiency in African countries, questions over whether to support armed struggle or just the diplomatic efforts, and mistrust between the OAU member contributors jockeying for power and primacy of own interests. Majority of the financial aid came overwhelmingly from African countries, which struggled with a formula to apportion the contributions between the members, and frequent defaults on countries paying up their dues. Western countries were not much help. Although the UN’s endorsed Africa’s position in curtailing economic, diplomatic and military relations with Portugal and South Africa, European countries—and Japan—continued to trade with South Africa, Rhodesia and Portugal. This was a clear violation of UN-imposed sanctions. Portugal, a member of NATO, “continued to use NATO weapons in Africa in violation of the treaty obligations.”63 NATO members took no actions toward imposing some sanction on Portugal, especially in light of geopolitical concerns, especially the Cold War. Appeals for financial support to the African liberation movements produced markedly similar results: the only meaningful assistance to fund the movements came from a church in Sweden. At the same time, African leaders articulated the position that their countries’ liberation was incomplete so long as Portuguese colonies, Rhodesia and South Africa were run by minority governments. Financially supporting liberation movements still fighting for independence in several African countries was thus indispensable. Liberation groups included: in Angola (MPLA, FNLA and UNITA), Guinea Bissau (PAIGC and FLING), Mozambique (FRELIMO and COREMO), Zimbabwe

63 Mohamed A. EI-Khawas, “The Quiet Role of OAU In Africa’s Liberation.” New Directions, vol. 5, no. 2 (January, 1978): 17. Available at http://dh.howard.edu/newdir ections/vol5/iss2/7.

78

S. M. MAGU

(Rhodesia—ZAPU, ZANU, ZIPA, FROLIZI, UANC), South Africa (ANC, PAC) and Namibia (Southwest Africa—SWANU, SWAPO).64 Items 3 and 4 of Article III of OAU’s Charter are the clearest statements of intent in the context of territorial integrity and the curious problem African countries inherited at independence: what to do about their made-in-Europe boundaries. They are: #3. Respect for the sovereignty and territorial integrity of each State and for its inalienable right to independent existence, and #4, Peaceful settlement of disputes by negotiation, mediation, conciliation or arbitration.65 The problem could have been easily predicted, perhaps not so the tension they imposed. Before they were colonized, African societies existed mostly as smaller, internally sovereign, territory holding entities with somewhat fluid borders. They had diverse systems of government, methods of deliberation, tax collection systems, administrative bureaucracies; they waged war and prosecuted peace, had working social systems such as juridical and education systems. Most proximate societies recognized the extent of their own—and others’ territories, and through diplomatic exchanges, affirmed that they were seen as legitimate polities. The challenge of subsuming these systems under a Westphalian type state, while dividing them sufficiently in order to successfully colonize them required delicate balance. After they gained independence, successor African governments found themselves with an intractable problem: expecting for the previously divided societies to form governments and unitary states. The most significant challenge was the level to which the disparate societies felt connected—or more accurately, disconnected—to and from each other as they approached independence: one might guess, none. These challenges would begin to manifest quickly; from attempts at secession to outright conflict in East Africa and West Africa, the conflicts quickly spread and spiraled. It would provide the first tests for OAU’s commitment to the principle of inviolability of boundaries: McKeon points to successes where the matter was simple, usually between two countries, and without the involvement of other parties, for example the October 1963, when “an Algerian-Moroccan frontier conflict developed into active hostilities. An extraordinary session of the Council of Ministers

64 EI-Khawas, “The Quiet Role of OAU In Africa’s Liberation”, 18. 65 African Union, OAU Charter (Web). n.d. Accessed from https://au.int/sites/def

ault/files/treaties/7759-file-oau_charter_1963.pdf.

3

POLITICS OF GEOGRAPHY, STATEHOOD …

79

was called at Addis Ababa from 15 to 18 November and this appointed a committee of arbitration which, in a series of eight meetings, helped check tension between the two countries. A cease-fire called by the OAU was accepted by the two countries.”66 In other instances, for example the protracted Congo crisis, McKeon notes that the ‘basic disagreement’ between the OAU members, the parties involved in the conflict, and the involvement of a joint AmericanBelgian contingent complicated the Congo issue and different African sides supported different sides of the Congo issue. “The UAR and Algeria offered the rebels material and moral aid. The Sudan, after a change of regime, became a sanctuary for rebel activity, and Congo-Brazzaville and Uganda allowed the ‘liberation movement’ soldiers to infiltrate into Congo-Leopoldville across their frontiers.”67 At the same time, the previous Francophone-vs-others split reappeared: Ghana, Guinea, Mali, Morocco and Tunisia opposed Tshombe, whereas the French nations were more subdued in their comments.68 Rarely is an African common foreign policy position clear, wellarticulated or unanimous. Indeed, history is riddled with obfuscation, pandering to European and other interests, interstate intervention based on flimsy excuses, or leaders took advantage of the ambiguous, nondefined ‘non-alignment’ position of the African Union. Intervention was often pursued—for example, Howe demonstrates that Kwame Nkrumah “had been supporting and training rebel groups opposed to several West African regimes”69 ; thus the 1963 position on borders was not just about borders; it also reinforced the inviolability of sovereignty and territory. These nefarious intervention activities often handicapped the OAU (and now AU) position especially where ultra-constitutional changes in government materialized—OAU was without exception opposed to such power transfers. Yet, the new leaders were able to participate in the OAU’s meetings, except in Tshombe’s case in 1964. In addition to Kwame Nkrumah, an avowed pan-Africanist, was guilty thereof; other African leaders taking 66 Nora McKeon, “The African States and the OAU.” International Affairs (Royal Institute of International Affairs 1944–42), no. 3 (1966): 394. https://doi.org/10. 2307/2612179. 67 McKeon, “The African States and the OAU”, 397–398. 68 McKeon, “The African States and the OAU”, 398. 69 Herbert M. Howe, Ambiguous Order: Military Forces in African States (Boulder,

CO: Lynne Rienner Publishers, 2004), 48.

80

S. M. MAGU

positions contrary to the OAU included Houphouet-Boigny and Hastings Kamuzu Banda; both of their positions differed from that of the broader African Union on the question of dis/engagement with the apartheid government of South Africa, an issue more broadly discussed elsewhere in this chapter. Confounding Challenge: Keep, Modify, Redraw or Discard Colonial Boundaries? Some of the challenges that the OAU inherited on boundaries, despite the pledge to respect territorial integrity of members imposed by colonial powers, were especially difficult to tackle. Indeed, some of the boundaries were so contentious that today, they have either had arbitration through the United Nations’ International Court of Justice, or are still an ongoing source of conflict between nations—for instance, the EritreaEthiopia disagreement over the province of Tigray. The magnitude of colonial boundaries and conflict arising from their defense or maintenance is seen in the number of conflicts they have caused, and the death toll thereof, with the number, the intensity, the belligerents and their supporters, and even the level of involvement by external actors—some in the OAU itself, some in pursuit of the broader geopolitical interests that were ably advanced by the Cold War, whereas others entailed attempting to regain post-colonial influence. The Center for Systemic Peace’s Political Instability in Africa data shows a number of conflicts within African states, particularly the two variables labeled (War) ‘violence between distinct, exclusive groups with the intent to impose a unilateral result to the contention’ and the ‘(Ethnic)intrastate involving the state agent and a distinct ethnic group,’ in over 20 instances.70 Ramutsindela records 24 boundary disputes, involving at least 24 countries, and restates Mazrui’s finding estimate: “two million lives have been lost defending the colonial boundaries of countries such as

70 Monty G. Marshall and Ted Robert Gurr, Peace and Conflict 2005: A Global Survey of Armed Conflicts, Self -Determination Movements and Democracy (College Park, MD: Center for International Development and Conflict Management, 2005). See especially Annex 1a. Major Episodes of Armed Conflict in Sub-Saharan Africa, 1946–2004. http:// www.systemicpeace.org/africaconflict.html.

3

POLITICS OF GEOGRAPHY, STATEHOOD …

81

Nigeria, Zaire, Sudan and Ethiopia.”71 There have been other strategies, including the rather creative one by Tanzania’s Julius Nyerere, ostensibly in pursuit of continental—perhaps regional—unity. Meyns, for example, pursued integration and unity, offering “to delay the proclamation date (for independence) so that the three East African countries Kenya, Uganda and Tanganyika could achieve their political freedom together as a single federal state”72 ; even though this did not happen, Tanganyika united with Zanzibar to form the United Republic of Tanzania, although it appears that Zanzibar was, and continues to be rather unhappy about becoming one with its bigger neighbor. Past scholarship challenges “consensus” positions on the role of Europeans and more directly, colonization, as relates to Africa: that Europeans did not impose colonial boundaries. According to scholars espousing this view, the goal of the 1885 Berlin Conference was to engender an organized system for recognizing territorial claims, rather than divide up the continent among themselves. Thus, by deciding not to challenge the colonial boundaries—never mind the challenges that would arise as claim and counter-claim was advanced—there are still those arguments that suggest that Africans themselves were complicit in creating the conditions that new boundaries impost. This view relies on the suggestion that Africans appeared to be more heavily bound to the principle of respecting the decision to uphold the colonial-era boundaries, rather than worrying about the socioeconomic activities and cultural heritage of those who lived in the same places before.73 Lawrence takes note of Mwakikagile’s argument, which appears to support this view, holding that “only about 171 ethnic groups out of more than 1000 across Africa were split by colonial boundaries”74 and that colonialism actually had the opposite effect, one of uniting Africans

71 Maano Ramutsindela, “African Boundaries and their Interpreters.” In Nurit Kliot and David Newman, Eds., Geopolitics at the End of the Twentieth Century: The Changing World, Political Map (London: Frank Cass, 2000), 183. 72 Peter Meyns, “The Quest for Freedom: Reflections on Nyerere‘s Political Thinking

and Practice.” In Ulf Engel, Gero Erdmann and Andreas Mehler, Eds., Tanzania Revisited: Political Stability, Aid Dependency, and Development Constraints (Hamburg: Institute of African Affairs, 2000) 153. 73 Ramutsindela, “African Boundaries and their Interpreters”, 182–183. 74 David Lawrence, Tanzania and Its People (Scotts Valley: Custom Books Publishing,

2009), 27.

82

S. M. MAGU

by giving them an object to focus on as a source of injustice and colonization. Colonialism guided them to think of themselves as one, opposed to colonial control—a position that may not have necessarily or easily developed absent colonialism. There may be thus a logically fallacious deliberation going on about who did what, and which countries—if recalibrating boundaries—would be allowed to partake of the exercise (elsewhere, scholarship shows more than 24 countries having border crises. What new land, what countries would lose territory, and which ones would add to their existing territory, and whether the territories should be based on ethnicity? What countries would lose people, and would such people voluntarily agree to move to a new state, given the comprehensive nature of the systems within a state—the pro-side of this debate might even appear to support irredentist ideas such as those found in Somalia and its Greater Somalia dream.75 Whether or not they were responsible for the ethnic factionalization in the colonies they would rule, some decisions made by the colonizing Europeans after the Berlin Conference almost made it inevitable that conflict over resources would arise upon independence. It is useful to highlight that given the approach by colonialists in the Kenya Highlands and in Rhodesia; it was not always clear that colonial powers thought they would give up the colonial territories. European powers brought their family feuds to Africa, based on personal relations and jealousies, taking over vanquished foes’ territorial possessions. Their monarchs also deigned to give away stuff that they hardly owned, in ways that would ultimately lead to border conflicts between African nations. An excellent example is the so-called ‘Roof of Africa,’ Mount Kilimanjaro. Officially, Mount Kilimanjaro is in Tanzania—every Kenyan school-age pupil knows to draw the squiggly line on the otherwise straight line from Lake Victoria to the small coastal town of Vanga, nearest to the Kenya/Tanzania border, making sure to exclude Mount Kilimanjaro from Kenya and into Tanzania. Prior to the British taking over Tanzania, it had been controlled by the Deutsch-Ostafrikanische Gesellschaft (German East Africa Company), later colonized by Germany. According to a Dr. Wahome, “it is said that the Britons gave it out to the Germans when defining the territories. This is partly confirmed by the 75 Fisher, “The Dividing of a Continent: Africa’s Separatist Problem” (Web). September 10, 2012. https://www.theatlantic.com/international/archive/2012/09/the-dividing-ofa-continent-africas-separatist-problem/262171/.

3

POLITICS OF GEOGRAPHY, STATEHOOD …

83

fact that the borderline from Lake Victoria to the Coast is straight and only broken by a curve around Kilimanjaro.”76 The more amusing rumor suggests that Kaiser Wilhelm II complained to her cousin (or, according to Kiruga’s version of the tale, her aunt), Queen Victoria, that Victoria had two mountains (and a lake) named after her (and Lake Albert, after her husband) and he had none; so, Queen Victoria gifted her cousin, Kaiser Wilhelm II, Mount Kilimanjaro as a birthday present in 1886. Kiruga, citing Heinz Schneppen, suggests that the more plausible reason was the demarcation agreement between Germans and the British: a line from Kilimanjaro to Speke Gulf (British) while Germans proposed a line from Kilimanjaro to the north of Musoma, in addition to an exchange of territories in Heligoland in Europe.77 Thus, the Germans got the mountain and the British got the coastal strip that included Mombasa, although it must be remembered that the coast—the 10-mile strip that included Mombasa, belonged to the Sultan of Zanzibar, and would not be incorporated into the Kenya Colony until 1920. That said, Heale, Wong and Spence hold that Tanganyika—and the gift mountain—did not exist as a defined area until it was occupied by the Germans in 1890.78 Perhaps that was warranted, because Kenya already had Mt. Kenya, Mt. Elgon, Suswa, Mt. Margaret, Satima, the dormant volcano that is Mt. Longonot and the Aberdare Ranges in the so-called White Highlands, which the British had no intention of giving up. Indeed, even today, the Mombasa Republican Council (MRC), a pro-secession group in Kenya, asserts that ‘Pwani si Kenya’—literally, ‘Coast is not in Kenya,’ given these historic conditions. Decidedly, cousins’ birthday or not, those in Kenya and Tanzania—in addition to the wildebeest and Zebras—have something to say about these boundaries. For good measure, these sorts of stories have made it into the mainstream literature, for example, in

76 Patrick Wachira, “Did Queen Victoria Yank Mount Kilimanjaro from Kenya?”

Standard Digital (Web), August 13, 2011. 77 By Morris Kiruga, “How Kilimanjaro Ended up in Tanzania”, Daily Nation (Web), July 15, 2013. https://www.nation.co.ke/lifestyle/dn2/How-Kilimanjaro-ended-up-inTanzania/957860-1914756-2bgola/index.html. 78 Jay Heale, Winnie Wong and Kelly Spence, Cultures of the World: Tanzania (New York: Cavendish Square Publishing, 2018).

84

S. M. MAGU

Melbourne,79 Holtzman80 and Western’s work,81 among others. Indeed, Western augments the birthday fable but adds that “Wilhelm himself gave the remote and scattered sanctuaries [on Mount Kilimanjaro] as a gift to his wife. Thereafter, Selous and other reserves became known as ‘Shamba la Bibi,’ or the wife’s farm, among Africans in the surrounding region.”82 The most significant activities were influenced and driven within the framework of the OAU and the United Nations, which were often quick to intervene when boundary issues began to escalate—for the most part, to avoid an all-out conflict and to utilize the existing mechanisms to resolve any boundary disagreements. This in no way means that the countries were bound to respect the outcomes of negotiations, or avoid war, considering that suspicion became a hallmark of most of the African countries and their leaders. Thus, even as he was proposing and introducing to the 1964 OAU Summit in Cairo, Egypt, a resolution to honor, even retain the colonial boundaries that the newly independent countries had inherited from colonialists, the beginnings of rumblings of conflict and secession were in the air, or had started to occur.83 Nyerere’s position is also seen as inadvertently taken to suggest that countries could chart their own path, rather than as part of the goal to pursue pan-African integration. One notable leader in intellectual opposition to Nyerere’s perspective was Kwame Nkrumah, whose perspective was the exact opposite. Quoting Nkrumah’s argument in the book I Speak of Freedom, Ramutsindela reflects Nkrumah‘s reservations: “it is heartening to see so many new flags hoisted in place of the old; it is disturbing to see so many countries of varying sizes and at different levels of development, weak and, in some cases, almost helpless. If this terrible state of fragmentation is allowed to continue, it may well be disastrous

79 Roy M. Melbourne, Conflict and Crises: A Foreign Service Story (Lanham: University Press of America, 1997). 80 Jon Holtzman, Killing Your Neighbors: Friendship and Violence in Northern Kenya and Beyond (Oakland: University of California Press, 2017). 81 In the Dust of Kilimanjaro. 82 David Western, In the

Dust Press/Shearwater Books, 1997), 26.

of

Kilimanjaro

(Washington,

DC:

Island

83 Godfrey Mwakikagile, Nyerere and Africa: End of an Era (Dar es Salaam: New Africa Press, 2010).

3

POLITICS OF GEOGRAPHY, STATEHOOD …

85

for us all.”84 Nkrumah’s foresight was important: to date, Africa lags in nearly every indicator of human development, even as some of the countries’ legislative organs enrich some and not others, with Nigeria and Kenya enjoying the dubious honor of having the highest paid legislators in the world. More fracturing would be in the works—for example, that of South Sudan, and Eritrea from Ethiopia. In a decidedly ironic twist of history and Tanzania’s position on the boundaries, Tanzania and Malawi have often feuded over whether or not Lake Nyasa—to Tanzanians—or Lake Malawi to those who live in Malawi is in any way part of Tanzania. The dispute, according to Khadiagala85 and Mayall86 among others, can be traced as far back as the AngloGerman agreement of 1890, which placed the eastern boundary of the lake as the line of demarcation with Tanzania. Tanzania, on the other hand, splits the lake into two and thus claims the half of the lake that is north of Mozambique and east of Malawi—the international demarcation line also considers this to be the proper boundary. The changes were, over time, affected by global geopolitical issues: after Germany lost World War I, Tanganyika Territory became a Mandate Territory controlled by the British. As early as 1902, then in 1920 and 1959, the British government was still attempting to secure clarification on where the border lies, and was advised by the Legislative Council (LegCo) that Tanzania had no claim to the lake despite having a substantial population that lived near the lake shores, carrying out economic activities based on access to the lake. Almost everywhere in Africa, the principle of sovereignty, territorial integrity and the inviolability of borders inherited from colonial powers were ably challenged by the situation on the ground. In practically every country, there were societies that occupied spaces extended across now international boundaries, producing what IDRC labels ‘cross-border

84 Maano Ramutsindela, “African Boundaries and Their Interpreters.” In Nurit Kliot and David Newman, Eds., Geopolitics at the End of the Twentieth Century: The Changing World, Political Map (London: Frank Cass, 2000), 182. 85 Gilbert M. Khadiagala, “Boundaries in Eastern Africa.” Journal of Eastern African Studies, vol. 4 no. 2 (2010): 266–278. https://doi.org/10.1080/17531055.2010. 487337. 86 James Mayall, “The Malawi-Tanzania Boundary Dispute.” The Journal of Modern African Studies, vol. 11, no. 4 (December, 1973): 611–62. https://www.jstor.org/sta ble/161618. Accessed November 3, 2019 04:10 UTC.

86

S. M. MAGU

kinship.’87 One of the major issues thereof was that even during colonialism, the colonial governments did not always enforce the idea of territorial cohesion and thereby totally restrict movement, apart from those areas where labor needed to be monitored—in East Africa, for example, the Kenya Highlands required members of the Gikuyu, Embu and Meru peoples to carry a “passbook” allowing movement from one farm to another. Enforcing this in a system where the main economic activity was pastoralism was nearly impossible. For the pastoral, nomadic peoples to suddenly need a passport was almost untenable. Coexistence Between Neighbors: Problems Abound Soon, neighboring states began experiencing bad blood, particularly over natural resources. Granted, some countries—such as Kenya and Tanzania—have generally enjoyed excellent relations, their immediate post-independence trajectories caused different treatment globally, especially by the British; for example, Holtzman holds that there was deep animosity “between the two countries, stemming from Kenya’s mostfavored-colony treatment by the British”88 particularly given the capitalist trajectory Kenya took, as Tanzania pursued ‘Ujamaa’, that is, African socialism. Some of the challenges that the OAU inherited on boundaries, despite the pledge to respect territorial integrity of members imposed by colonial powers, were especially difficult to tackle. Some countries attempted to deal quickly with the conflict inherent in the boundaries they inherited as soon as they could, through negotiation mechanisms and even through continent-wide arrangements. An important case thereof is to be found in Nigeria, which called for the formation of an OAU Boundary Council, a proposal made to the 37th Meeting of the Ministerial Council, held in Nairobi in 1981.89 When the meeting failed to endorse the proposal, Nigeria promulgated its own

87 Nyasha Chishakwe, Nicholas Tandi and Stella Musiiwa, “Southern African Programme for Improved Transboundary NRM: Equitable Access and Benefit Sharing.” In Fiona Flintan and Shibru Tedla, Eds., Natural Resource Management: The Impact of Gender and Social Issues (Kampala: Fountain Publishers, 2010). 88 Jon Holtzman, Killing Your Neighbors: Friendship and Violence in Northern Kenya and Beyond (Oakland: University of California Press, 2017), 231. 89 A. I. Isiwaju, “Cross-Border Relations in Africa.” In Celestine Oyom Bassey and Oshita O. Oshita, Eds., Governance and Border Security in Africa (Lagos; Malthouse Press Limited, 2010).

3

POLITICS OF GEOGRAPHY, STATEHOOD …

87

council, which had an international mandate—rather unusual, because it wasn’t clear that other countries would be bound by the work, or findings, of the Nigerian Council. Isiwaju does note that, despite Nigeria’s rather unusual reputation globally in the context of corruption, the Boundary council was competent and driven, that it demonstrated its seriousness and found that countries took its work seriously. Even though it did not have a continental or regional flavor, considering that it was the creation of Nigeria, the council carried out workshops in all the countries that bordered Nigeria, bringing about a more integrated region, and helping bring about other joint efforts, for example the Nigeria-Niger Joint Commission on Cooperation, and also with Benin to the west; Isiwaju holds that other outcomes of this council, the conferences, workshops and outreach it did was important toward strengthening the ECOWAS cooperation and later, the ECOMOG military force. Notwithstanding, Nigeria has had a long-standing, simmering conflict between itself and Cameroon, over the oil-rich Bakassi peninsula, arguably negating the work that the Boundary Council had managed to achieve. The most significant activities were influenced by, and occurred within the more formal institutional frameworks of the OAU and the United Nations. Both organizations were quick to intervene when border conflicts began to escalate—for the most part, to avoid an all-out conflict and to utilize the existing mechanisms to resolve disagreements. This in no way means that the countries were bound to respect the outcomes of negotiations, or avoid war, considering that suspicion became a hallmark of most of the African countries and their leaders—and that implicitly, Chapter 7 of the Charter of the United Nations provided for members’ self-defense, an oft-invoked pretext to interfere in other countries’ activities. Thus, even as he was proposing and introducing to the 1964 OAU Summit in Cairo, Egypt, a resolution to honor, even retain the colonial boundaries that the newly independent countries had inherited from colonialists, the beginnings of rumblings of conflict and secession were in the air, or had started to occur.90 Nyerere’s position is also seen as inadvertently taken to suggest that countries could chart their own path, rather than as part of the goal to pursue pan-African integration. One of the most significant leaders 90 Godfrey Mwakikagile, Nyerere and Africa: End of an Era (Dar es Salaam: New Africa Press, 2010).

88

S. M. MAGU

in intellectual opposition to Nyerere’s perspective was Kwame Nkrumah, whose perspective was the exact opposite. Quoting Nkrumah‘s argument in the book I Speak of Freedom, Ramutsindela reflects Nkrumah’s reservations: “it is heartening to see so many new flags hoisted in place of the old; it is disturbing to see so many countries of varying sizes and at different levels of development, weak and, in some cases, almost helpless. If this terrible state of fragmentation is allowed to continue, it may well be disastrous for us all.”91 Nkrumah’s foresight was important: to date, Africa lags in nearly every indicator of human development, even as some of the countries’ legislative organs enrich some and not others, with Nigeria and Kenya enjoying the highest paid legislators in the world. More fracturing would be in the works—for example, that of South Sudan, and Eritrea from Ethiopia. In a decidedly ironic twist of history and Tanzania’s position on the boundaries, Tanzania and Malawi have often feuded over whether or not Lake Nyasa—to Tanzanians—or Lake Malawi to those who live in Malawi is in any way part of Tanzania. The dispute, according to Khadiagala92 and Mayall93 among others, can be traced as far back as the AngloGerman agreement of 1890, which placed the eastern boundary of the lake as the line of demarcation with Tanzania. Tanzania, on the other hand, splits the lake into two and thus claims the half of the lake that is north of Mozambique and east of Malawi - the international demarcation line also considers this to be the proper boundary. The changes were, over time, affected by global geopolitical issues: after Germany lost World War I, Tanganyika Territory became a Mandate Territory controlled by the British. As early as 1902, then in 1920 and 1959, the British government was still attempting to secure clarification on where the border lies, and was advised by the Legislative Council (LegCo) that Tanzania had no claim to the lake despite having a substantial population that lived near

91 Maano Ramutsindela, “African Boundaries and Their Interpreters.” In Nurit Kliot and David Newman, Eds., Geopolitics at the End of the Twentieth Century: The Changing World, Political Map (London: Frank Cass, 2000), 182. 92 Gilbert M. Khadiagala, “Boundaries in Eastern Africa.” Journal of Eastern African Studies, vol. 4, no. 2 (2010): 266–278. https://doi.org/10.1080/17531055.2010. 487337. 93 James Mayall, “The Malawi-Tanzania Boundary Dispute.” The Journal of Modern African Studies, vol. 11, no. 4 (December, 1973): 611–628. https://www.jstor.org/sta ble/161618, Accessed November 3, 2019 04:10 UTC.

3

POLITICS OF GEOGRAPHY, STATEHOOD …

89

the lake shores, carrying out economic activities based on access to the lake. Persistence: The Ethnic Problem of Boundaries Almost everywhere in Africa, the principle of sovereignty, territorial integrity and the inviolability of borders inherited from colonial powers was frequently and often, ably challenged by the situation on the ground. In almost every country, there were societies that occupied spaces extending across now international boundaries, producing what IDRC labels ‘cross-border kinship.’94 One of the major issues thereof was that even during colonialism, colonial governments did not always enforce the idea of territorial cohesion, primarily because lack of movement benefitted colonialism with control functions; movement was not totally prohibited apart from those areas where labor needed to be monitored. In East Africa, for example, effective colonial control of the fertile Kenya Highlands simultaneously required members of the Gikuyu, Embu and Meru peoples to carry a “passbook” from one farm to another. Enforcing this in a system where the main economic activity was pastoralism, as was the case with the Maasai and other Nilotic groups, was inherently unfeasible. After independence, this did not change much: for the pastoral, nomadic peoples to be suddenly required to possess a passport to do the same activities that they had always undertaken, was almost untenable, and largely unenforceable, further complicating the notion of sovereign boundaries. But could Africa have benefitted from an unusual arrangement, one that respected the Westphalian state and its imposed boundaries, while recognizing the challenge inherent in inserting a boundary smack in the middle of a community? Perhaps. Over the longer term, the challenges of boundaries took on a more sinister driving force: an outgrowth of capitalism, that is, natural resources. Quite often, the conflicts found happy cheerleaders outside of the continent. In places such as the Congo the secession of the Shaba/Katanga region, despite—or because of—the rich deposits of natural resources, in this case specifically minerals such as copper, cobalt, diamonds, gold, tin, manganese and uranium—the latter critical in the-then ongoing global superpower race to produce nuclear 94 Nyasha Chishakwe, Nicholas Tandi, and Stella Musiiwa, “Southern African Programme for Improved Transboundary NRM: Equitable Access and Benefit Sharing.” In Fiona Flintan and Shibru Tedla, Eds., Natural Resource Management: The Impact of Gender and Social Issues (Kampala: Fountain Publishers, 2010).

90

S. M. MAGU

fissile material and thus weapons, Lumumba’s move to change the status quo led to the CIA fomenting a coup, and indeed supporting the secession of the south (in cahoots with Belgium) in order to install a puppet government in the Katanga Province (or republic)95 —people the US could control. Perhaps without much realization, African countries were playing chess, a game whose pieces were being moved everywhere else except in Addis Ababa—that is, in Washington, Brussels, Moscow and Beijing. And so, the conflicts, the wars, persisted. In places such as, and between Eritrea and Ethiopia, Ethiopia and her dreams and so on. Examples abound, including the Nigeria/Cameroon conflict over the Bakassi Peninsula, ownership of resources such as oil versus their extraction. In short order, even states that had started off co-existing peacefully soon began experiencing conflict between disparate parts of the society, particularly over natural resources, which could enrich the leaders as well as their countries. Granted, the conflict was often about the unequal allocation of resources among the different ethnic groups, appointments to the government and such. Indeed, Nigeria’s Biafran War can be attributed to secessionist movements, the ideas of a separate homeland, and nationhood based on ethnicity. From both within the nation and often from outside, Africa’s border question would become its Achille’s Heel, despite that on paper, countries pledged to respect existing boundaries, but in practice, this rarely happened. The conflicts that would become a hallmark of African countries and their governments, besides the Zaire/Katanga issue, manifested quite early on. For example, as unapologetically pan-African federalist as he was, Nkrumah intervened regularly—especially in Togo, where the Togolese government under Sylvanus Olympio accused Nkrumah of orchestrating coup d’états with the alleged concurrence of the French who feared that Olympio was becoming too close to the British and Americans and drifting away from French influence—after all, France had controlled Togo under the Treaty of Versailles’ Mandate after World War I. Thus, Nkrumah was doing everything that the OAU was not supposed to do: engender conflict between new nations, interfere in the activities of another sovereign African nation, and aligning himself with the Soviets

95 Ronald Hans Pahl, Creative Ways to Teach the Mysteries of History. Volume 1 (Lanham: Rowman & Littlefield Education, 2005).

3

POLITICS OF GEOGRAPHY, STATEHOOD …

91

despite the proposition of neutrality. In Olympio’s case, the inability— perhaps refusal—of the French to give up on exerting influence in the newly independent country, and utilizing the unsettled question of the Ewe people in Eastern Togo/Western Ghana was a formidable, disrupting event, assuring that the road to future federalism, and more presciently, conflict between African countries, was simmering. Indeed, although he had wanted to have no military forces in Togo, Olympio was so concerned with Ghana—and Kwame Nkrumah’s designs—that he allowed the formation of a small military. Ironically, it was the same military that assassinated him in 1963—the first African head of state to be killed during the process of a coup d’état.96 More broadly, the question of conflict between African countries and their leaders, territorial disputes, the pursuit of, and membership to regional associations, parallel to the formation and the ultimate goals of the OAU, as an area of joint foreign policy position for African countries pre-occupied the continent, often sabotaging the likelihood of a federated Africa right from the onset. This issue is tackled elsewhere, but it is important to examine how, in addition to other issues, it fostered conditions that made it difficult to agree on much of anything—forward progress, common foreign policy positions and borders. Further complicating the OAU and its agenda was the presence of residual regional organizations often with a continental flavor, for example the AAPC. There were genuine concerns, expressed by the heads of state, and some of them surrounded the question of giving up sovereignty so soon after displacing colonial powers. In the words of President Bourguiba of Tunisia in response to the proposition for a federal continental structure— thereby diminishing borders, “we hardly know each other and we have barely had time to draw up an inventory of the things which bring us together and which divide us.”97 It was a position that was widely echoed by other African leaders such as Keita of Mali—and perhaps one that had some merit; after all, African countries had been independent less than 96 Kwesi Aning and Naila Salihu, “The ‘Northern Problem’: Postcolony, Identity and Political (in)Stability in Cote d’Ivoire and Togo.” In Ndlovu-Sabelo J. Gatsheni and Brilliant Mhlanga, Eds., Bondage of Boundaries and Identity Politics in Postcolonial Africa: The ‘Northern Problem’ and Ethno-Futures (Pretoria, RSA: African Institute of South Africa, 2013). 97 K. Matthews, “The Organization of African Unity.” In Mazzeo, Ed., African Regional Organizations, Domenico (Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 1984), 49.

92

S. M. MAGU

10 years, and colonization entailed the deprivation of the right to selfdetermination, self-government and sovereignty.

Concluding Thoughts Even before it was inaugurated, the Organization of African Unity faced steep odds of success. The odds stemmed from a variety of sources— some systemic, some based on personality, some internal, some external. For starters, the OAU was the compromise position on several approaches to continental unity—federation of African states, operating much akin to the United States, or a loose continental body that included all independent members but preserved the central elements of sovereignty. A third approach revolved around regional integration, with the ultimate goal of integrating these regional organizations into a continental body, in some ways similar to the gradualism that was the genesis of the modern-day EU. But challenges loomed, from the very beginning: some driven by the independence-era leaders, determined to drive their agenda through, but stymied by equally powerful personalities of competing leaders and positions. In and of itself, this procured significant instances of suspicion about intentions—of countries, of leaders, and even of promoting subversion and potential government changes within the neighboring African states. A second challenge stemmed from the immediate history of the member states of the nascent union: colonization. As early as during the formation of the organization, the different blocs advocated different positions, some of which were based on the former colonizer. For example, the Brazzaville Group, which created the Union of African and Malagasy States, was predominantly Francophone,98 comprising of Cameroon, Congo-Brazzaville, Côte d’Ivoire, Dahomey (Benin), Gabon, Upper Volta (Burkina Faso), Madagascar, Mauritania, Niger, the Central African Republic, Senegal and Chad.99 The Brazzaville Group proceeded apace with the development of institutions that preceded, but would be mirrored by those of the OAU, only at the regional level—for example, 98 Gordon Harris, The Organization of African Unity, Vol. 7 (Oxford: CLIO Press, 1994). 99 Moses K. Tesi, Balancing Sovereignty and Development in International Affairs: Cameroon’s Post-Independence Relations with France, Africa, and the World (Lanham: Lexington Books, 2017); see also: AFDB, “Bank Group’s Evolution” (Web). n.p.

3

POLITICS OF GEOGRAPHY, STATEHOOD …

93

the Organisation Africaine et Malgache de Cooperation Economique (OAMCE) to foster economic cooperation; it continued to meet, often within a few months of OAU meetings, even as the OAU was in the process of becoming better organized.100 On the other hand, the Casablanca and Monrovia groups were more of an amalgamation of countries—the Casablanca Group had Ghana, Guinea, Mali, Libya, Egypt, Morocco and Algeria—some had been British, some French colonies, and the group was especially interventionist in the Algerian conflict (or war of independence against the French), and in the Congo crisis. The Monrovia Group included Cameroon, Liberia, Nigeria and Togo.101 Even as the continental organization proceeded to take shape and incorporate more members under the 1963 Charter of the OAU, some of the regional groupings continued to exist, sometimes to transform themselves; “the UAM [Monrovia group] ended its political status but transformed itself into the African and Malagasy Union for Economic Cooperation, which became the Common African and Malagasy Union in 1965” (or OCAM).102 OCAM would continue its existence until 1985. What was especially interesting was that the Congo joined OCAM in 1965, while Mauritius joined in 1970. In the case of the other regional organizations, for example PAFMECSA, the membership was limited to countries that were geographically contiguous. OCAM was continentally distributed, with the memberships distributed from east to central to west Africa. The third most significant challenge was external to the continent: African countries came into being during the height—indeed what most consider to be the coldest part of—the Cold War. Given global geopolitical complexities—such as US alliances with European powers that were previous or then-current colonial powers and with the apartheid South African government, the treatment of minorities in the US—especially African Americans, the willingness of the USSR and China to extend technical assistance to the new African states—whether out of spite for the west, to gain a competitive advantage in global geopolitics or in

100 Tesi, Balancing Sovereignty and Development in International Affairs, 2017. 101 Olufemi Amao. African Union Law: The Emergence of a Sui Generis Legal Order

(London: Routledge, 2018). 102 Jacqueline Anne Braveboy-Wagner, Institutions of the Global South (New York: Routledge, 2009), 78.

94

S. M. MAGU

the genuine pursuit of equality alluded to by communism, African countries and leaders often turned east, to the consternation of the west. The result was often some version of intervention with the objective of regime change: in the Congo crisis, and in 1966, Ghana’s Kwame Nkrumah was overthrown in a coup d’état. It did not help either, that African countries themselves frequently intervened in the affairs of their own neighbors and often with the same outcomes. The OAU was off to an inauspicious start.

References ———. “Organization of African Unity.” International Organization, Vol. 17, No. 4 (Autumn, 1963): 989–991. https://www.jstor.org/stable/2705119. ———. “Pan-African Freedom Movement of East and Central Africa (PAFMECA).” International Organization, Vol. 16, No. 2, Africa and International Organization (Spring, 1962): 446–448. https://www.jstor.org/sta ble/2705401. Adejumobi, Saheed A. The History of Ethiopia. Westport: Greenwood Press, 2007. AFDB. Bank Group’s Evolution (Web). Available from https://www.afdb.org/ en/about-us/corporate-information/history/group-evolution/. African Union. OAU Charter (Web). n.d. Accessed from https://au.int/sites/ default/files/treaties/7759-file-oau_charter_1963.pdf. Aghrout, Ahmed. “Africa’s Experiences with Regional Co-Operation and Integration: Assessing some Groupings.” Africa: Rivista Trimestrale Di Studi e Documentazione Dell’Istituto Italiano per l’Africa e l’Oriente, Vol. 47, No. 4 (1992): 563–586. JSTOR www.jstor.org/stable/40760734. Amao, Olufemi. African Union Law: The Emergence of a Sui Generis Legal Order. London: Routledge, 2018. Anda, Michael O. International Relations in Contemporary Africa. Lanham: University Press of America, Inc., 2000. Aning, Kwesi and Naila Salihu. “The ‘Northern problem’: Postcolony, identity and political (in)stability in Cote d’Ivoire and Togo.” In Bondage of Boundaries and Identity Politics in Postcolonial Africa: The ‘Northern Problem’ and Ethno-Futures. Edited by Ndlovu-Sabelo J. Gatsheni and Brilliant Mhlanga. Pretoria, RSA: African Institute of South Africa, 2013. Arnold, Guy. Guide to African Political and Economic Development. London: Fitzroy Dearborn, 2001. Belmessous, Saliha. “The Paradox of Empire by Treaty.” In Empire by Treaty: Negotiating European Expansion, 1600–1900. Edited by Saliha Belmessous. New York: Oxford University Press, 2015.

3

POLITICS OF GEOGRAPHY, STATEHOOD …

95

Burke, Roland. Decolonization and the Evolution of International Human Rights. Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 2010. Braveboy-Wagner, Jacqueline Anne. Institutions of the Global South. New York: Routledge, 2009. Das, Veena. “Collective Violence and the Shifting Categories of Communal Riots, Ethnic Cleansing and Genocide.” In The Historiography of Genocide. Edited by Dan Stone. New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2008. EI-Khawas, Mohamed A. “The Quiet Role of OAU In Africa’s Liberation,” New Directions: Vol. 5: No. 2, (Jan, 1978): 16-19. URL: http://dh.howard.edu/ newdirections/vol5/iss2/7. Elias, T. O. “The Charter of the Organization of African Unity,” American Journal of International Law, Vol. 59, No. 2 (April, 1965): 243–267. https://www.jstor.org/stable/2196967. Eznack, Lucile. Crises in the Atlantic Alliance: Affect and Relations Among NATO Members. New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2012. Fisher, Max. “The Dividing of a Continent: Africa’s Separatist Problem.” (Web). September 10, 2012. https://www.theatlantic.com/international/archive/ 2012/09/the-dividing-of-a-continent-africas-separatist-problem/262171/. Harris, Gordon. The Organization of African Unity. Vol. 7. Oxford: CLIO Press, 1994. Heale, Jay, Winnie Wong and Kelly Spence. Cultures of the World: Tanzania. New York: Cavendish Square Publishing, 2018. Hellmann, Gunther and Ursula Stark Urrestarazu. Theories of Foreign Policy. Oxford Bibliographies, 2013 (web). https://doi.org/10.1093/obo/978019 9743292-0104. Holtzman, Jon. Killing Your Neighbors: Friendship and Violence in Northern Kenya and Beyond. Oakland: University of California Press, 2017. Howe, Herbert M. Ambiguous Order: Military Forces in African States. Boulder, CO: Lynne Rienner Publishers, 2004. International Committee of the Red Cross. “Treaties, States Parties and Commentaries: Ethiopia - Historical Documents”, n.d. (Web). Isiwaju, A. I. “Cross-Border Relations in Africa.” In Governance and Border Security in Africa. Edited by Celestine Oyom Bassey and Oshita O. Oshita. Lagos: Malthouse Press Limited, 2010. Kamal, Humayun Akhter. “Organization of African Unity.” Pakistan Horizon, Vol. 26, No. 1 (First Quarter, 1973): 36–47. https://www.jstor.org/stable/ 41393158. Accessed September 3, 2019 01:12 UTC. Khadiagala, Gilbert M. “Boundaries in Eastern Africa.” Journal of Eastern African Studies, Vol. 4, No. 2 (2010): 266–278. https://doi.org/10.1080/ 17531055.2010.487337. Khanna, Tarun. Billions of Entrepreneurs: How China and India Are Reshaping Their Futures and Yours. Boston: Harvard Business School Press, 2007.

96

S. M. MAGU

Lawrence, David. Tanzania and Its People. Scotts Valley: Custom Books Publishing, 2009. Lee, Christopher J. “The Rise of Third World Diplomacy: Success and Its Meanings at the 1955 Asian-African Conference in Bandung, Indonesia.” In Foreign Policy Breakthroughs: Cases in Successful Diplomacy. Edited by Robert Hutchings and Jeremi Suri. New York: Oxford University Press, 2015. Lockard, Craig A. Societies, Networks, and Transitions: A Global History, 3rd ed. Stamford: Cengage Learning, 2015. Makinda, Samuel M. and F. Wafula Okumu. The African Union: Challenges of Globalization, Security, and Governance. New York: Routledge, 2007. Manning, Patrick. The African Diaspora: A History Through Culture. New York: Columbia University Press, 2009. Marshall, Monty G. and Ted Robert Gurr. Peace and Conflict 2005: A Global Survey of Armed Conflicts, Self-Determination Movements and Democracy. College Park, MD: Center for International Development and Conflict Management, 2005. http://www.systemicpeace.org/africaconflict.html. Matthews, K. “The Organization of African Unity.” In African Regional Organizations. Edited by Domenico Mazzeo. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 1984. Mayall, James. “The Malawi-Tanzania Boundary Dispute.” The Journal of Modern African Studies, Vol. 11, No. 4 (December, 1973): 611–628. https://www.jstor.org/stable/161618. Melbourne, Roy M. Conflict and Crises: A Foreign Service Story. Lanham: University Press of America, 1997. Meyns, Peter, “The Quest for Freedom: Reflections on Nyerere’s Political Thinking and Practice.” In Tanzania Revisited: Political Stability, Aid Dependency, and Development Constraints. Edited by Ulf Engel, Gero Erdmann and Andreas Mehler. Hamburg: Institute of African Affairs, 2000. McKeon, Nora. “The African States and the OAU.” International Affairs (Royal Institute of International Affairs 1944–42), no. 3 (1966): 390–409. https:// doi.org/10.2307/2612179. Mwakikagile, Godfrey. Nyerere and Africa: End of an Era. Dar es Salaam: New Africa Press, 2010. Nanjira, Daniel Don. African Foreign Policy and Diplomacy from Antiquity to the 21st Century. Vol. 1. Santa Barbara: Praeger, 2010. Nkrumah, Kwame. Africa Must Unite. London: Heineman Educational Books Ltd., 1963. Packham, Eric S. Africa in War and Peace. New York: Nova Science Publishers, Inc., 2004. “Organization of African Unity.” International Organization, Vol. 17, No. 4 (1963): 989–991. http://www.jstor.org/stable/2705119.

3

POLITICS OF GEOGRAPHY, STATEHOOD …

97

“Organization of African Unity (OAU).” International Encyclopedia of the Social Sciences. Encyclopedia.com (February 27, 2019). https://www.encycl opedia.com/social-sciences/applied-and-social-sciences-magazines/organizat ion-african-unity-oau. Pahl, Ronald Hans. Creative Ways to Teach the Mysteries of History. Volume 1. Lanham: Rowman & Littlefield Education, 2005. Parsons, Timothy. The Rule of Empires: Those Who Built Them, Those Who Endured Them, and Why They Always Fall. New York: Oxford, 2010. Poe, Daryl Zizwe. Kwame Nkrumah’s Contribution to Pan-African Agency: An Afrocentric Analysis. New York: Routledge, 2003. Ramutsindela, Maano. “African Boundaries and Their Interpreters.” In Geopolitics at the End of the Twentieth Century: The Changing World, Political Map. Edited by Nurit Kliot and David Newman. London: Frank Cass, 2000. Tesi, Moses K. Balancing Sovereignty and Development in International Affairs: Cameroon’s Post-Independence Relations with France, Africa, and the World. Lanham: Lexington Books, 2017. Thompson, Willard Scott. Ghana’s Foreign Policy, 1957–1966: Diplomacy Ideology, and the New State. Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1969. Tucker, Spencer C., ed. The Encyclopedia of Middle East Wars: The United States in the Persian Gulf, Afghanistan, and Iraq Conflicts. Volume 1: A-D. Santa Barbara: ABC-CLIO, 2010. UNICEF. “Levels & Trends in Child Mortality Report, 2018.” New York, 2018. Accessed from https://data.unicef.org/wp-content/uploads/2018/ 10/Child-Mortality-Report-2018.pdf. United Nations. “GA: Resolutions Adopted by the GA During Its 15th Session.” United Nations. http://www.un.org/documents/ga/res/15/ares15.htm. United Nations. Treaty Series Treaties and international agreements registered or filed and recorded with the Secretariat of the United Nations. Vol. 299 (1958): 4303–4325. Available at http://treaties.un.org/doc/publication/ unts/volume%20299/v299.pdf. United Nations. “United Nations and Decolonization.” Main Documents— Declaration on the Granting of Independence to Colonial Countries and Peoples. United Nations. www.un.org/en/decolonization/declaration.shtml. Vestal, Theodore M. “Reflections on the Battle of Adwa and Its Significance for Today.” In The Battle of Adwa: Reflections on Ethiopia’s Historic Victory Against European Imperialism. Edited by Paulos Milkias and Getachew Metaferia. New York: Algora Publishing, 2005. Yousuf, Hilmi S. “The OAU and the African Liberation Movement,” Pakistan Horizon, Vol. 38, No. 4 (Fourth Quarter 1985): 55–67. https://www.jstor. org/stable/41394216. Wallerstein, Immanuel. “The Role of the Organization of African Unity in Contemporary African Politics.” In Africa and International Organization.

98

S. M. MAGU

Edited by Yassin El-Ayouty and H.C. Brooks. The Hague: Martinus Nijhoff, 1974. Western, David. In the Dust of Kilimanjaro. Washington, DC: Island Press/Shearwater Books, 1997. Woollacott, Martin and Angela Woollacott. After Suez: Adrift in the American Century. London: I.B. Tauris & Co., Ltd., 2005.

CHAPTER 4

Africa Huru! Complex Events—Cold War, Residual Colonization and Apartheid

Introduction This chapter addresses the light that the OAU, once founded, shone on the twin issues of apartheid in South Africa and Ian Smith’s Unilateral Declaration of Independence (UDI). The OAU worked in concert with other IGOs such as the UN. Besides apartheid and UDI, African countries continued to gain independence: by 1968, 48 of 55 African countries (with Ethiopia/Eritrea and Sudan/South Sudan split) were free nations. As the largest bloc at the UN, and with the support of other voting blocs (e.g., Asian countries and G77/NAM), the OAU was vocal, and benefitted from unusual allies: the USSR. USSR’s Cold War strategy saw Khrushchev sponsor UN Security Council resolutions to highlight US and its allies’ imperialist practices as they waged war against communist regimes around the world. Whether or not soviet support for decolonization stemmed from a belief of self-determination (despite its control in Eastern Europe and USSR member states) is in question, but Africa benefitted nonetheless. It also addresses tensions that were beginning to show in Africa, with some members (e.g., Malawi, Ivory Coast and Madagascar) supporting some rapprochement with South Africa and Rhodesia, in order to bring about changes in the country, especially based on economic interconnectedness, dependency on and benefits from South Africa. As previously shown, the founding of the Organization of African Unity (OAU) brooked quite the bevy of challenges, disagreements and © The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2021 S. M. Magu, Explaining Foreign Policy in Post-Colonial Africa, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-62930-4_4

99

100

S. M. MAGU

potential internal and external sabotage to the envisioned continental unity and organization. The challenges, especially, ranged from disagreements on the structure of the proposed organization (whether to adopt a federal structure or loose association) to the activities the new organization was going to be involved in (e.g., an abortive African High Command was proposed, to function in the realm of military affairs) to troubles with deciding the country obligations and dues in order to finance the new organization, to challenges by residual regional and continental organizations formed before or concurrently with the OAU, to the ongoing (neo-colonial) influence by the former colonial powers, to joint and common positions on issues of importance to Africa in Africa and at the United Nations and in the context of geopolitical issues. It is important to recall that, although African countries jointly and individually aspired to the liberation of their peoples—and that of other Africans, this was about all they agreed upon. How, who, whose role, levels of interconnectedness and relations with the former colonial powers—were as disparate as the countries themselves, their peoples and the different colonial experiences, and divisions that even the former colonial powers exploited. Parallel to the formation of the different linguistic regional alliances, the positions of the new organization reflected surprising, even counterintuitive expectations, such as the tepid support for liberation, and whether or not the best path to achieving a liberated Africa was through military actions or diplomatic engagement. Thus, among, and between the countries and their regional affiliations, a number of issues would become critical as the countries navigated the new environment, one in which their input was minimal, undervalued and unappreciated. They sought to make an impact in a world order not designed with them in mind, an economic order that relegated them to the periphery, with their economies dependent on producing goods for the Global North—and ironically, their former colonizers. Interestingly, most of the newly minted African leaders had spent some time in the western capitals, in the very centers of power of the governments then colonizing them. Even as they sought to represent their people, present their grievances and seek (mostly) peaceful resolutions, their time had an impact on their personal, and later, political lives. Even more significantly, they became educated in the ways of the foreign powers, often supported, even funded by the same colonizers. Thus, out of their educational, employment and other pursuits, some picked up radical tendencies, reflected in their post-independence leanings, while

4

AFRICA HURU! COMPLEX EVENTS—COLD WAR …

101

simultaneously, western powers sought to moderate the fiery rhetoric— and orators—into future, compliant independent Africa leaders. Indeed, in many countries such as Kenya and Zimbabwe, the more ‘moderate’ liberation leaders were supported by the colonizers, pitted against the more militant pro-independence figures, e.g., Dedan Kimathi or Joshua Nkomo. A survey of independent Africa leaders’ experiences demonstrates the similarity of their experiences prior to their taking up the mantle for liberation: Kwame Nkrumah studied in the US during its ascendancy to global superpower status and still racially exclusionary of African Americans— before he relocated to the United Kingdom, the colonizing power of the Gold Coast. In East Africa, Jomo Kenyatta spent time in, studied and married in London, before he returned to Kenya to lead the Mau Mau independence movement fighting against British colonization. Julius Nyerere, the ardent pan-Africanist and future Prime Minister/President of Tanzania studied at the University of Edinburgh. Years prior, his southern neighbor-statesman, Hastings Kamuzu Banda, the first president of independent Malawi, had also studied in the US, at the University of Chicago. In the Francophone world, the likes of Léopold Sédar Senghor studied in France, at the University of Sorbonne. There is no doubt that some of their future perspectives would be informed by their experiences in the west, in addition to what was going on in their countries, but now with the complication imposed by the Cold War. The early years of the Cold War would have significant impact on the trajectory of the newly independent countries. The impacts included the contestation between support for foreign intervention in intrastate and interstate conflicts, in removal and installment of (new) governments sympathetic to either one, or the other side of the Cold War divide, armed support for independence or not, among other contested practices. They would also feature the very same African countries’ intervention in others’ affairs: from subversion, to supporting armed rebellions, to complicity in the assassination/s of leaders. Although at independence most of African countries presented as multiparty democracies, within their first ten years of independence, nearly all of them, except Senegal, Gambia and Botswana became one-party states. Sovereignty would continue to be the linchpin of their existence, and the African Union the continental ‘talk-shop,’ divided, riven by the several positions the countries took on issues of import to the continent. The goal of this chapter is to examine how Africa formulated (or did not) common positions on issues of the

102

S. M. MAGU

Cold War, Non-Alignment and the general progress toward liberation on the entire continent. Finding Common Positions: UN, OAU and Anti-colonial Efforts One of the most urgent issues that faced the Organization of African Union was the question of liberation; at the founding of OAU, almost half of the continent was still under colonial rule, while some countries were experiencing conflict in the fight for independence. That said, majority of African countries had ultimately gained independence by the middle of the 1960s decade—the dominoes of colonialism fell rather quickly. At the beginning of 1960, 10 countries, including Liberia and Ethiopia which are often considered to never have been colonized, were independent. At the end of 1960, 16 countries had gained independence, all but two from France. By the middle of the 1960s decade, 35 of the 54 (55, with Western Sahara) African countries were independent; by 1968, the number had risen to 40 countries. Even as liberation spread, there remained a number of countries under colonial control, and between the OAU’s Liberation Committee, meetings of the OAU, meetings at the United Nations General Assembly and at the Security Council, and other forms of pressure including trade boycotts, denial of overflights and intense lobbying in western capitals, African countries continued to seek independence for the remaining colonies, five of which were controlled by Portugal, two by Britain, two by France and one South African Mandate territory. The United Nations and Decolonization One of the most fortuitous and high-visibility avenues available to the (then-still) colonized nations of Africa was external to the continent— indeed, at first glance, it would appear to be the rather unlikely source of support for African countries’ pursuit for liberation from colonialism. The avenue stemmed not from the pan-African Congresses organized in support of liberation of all black peoples of the earth, which had taken place in several European capitals from the early 1900s through to shortly before independence, but from a progressive American-driven pursuit for a new global order, one devoid of the kind of imperialism that had driven Europe to two global wars within the space of 25 years. Yet even in this new order, disorder was rife with sectoral, racial, ideological, historical and also stemmed from reasons that made the US a rather curious driving

4

AFRICA HURU! COMPLEX EVENTS—COLD WAR …

103

force for a new liberal world order. Indeed, in the case of Africa, the USSR might have been a more selfish, but better advocate for liberation, its suspect goals notwithstanding. Traditionally, the US presented itself as a bastion of freedom, of liberalism and as an anti-colonial nation—having won its independence from Britain in the late 1700s. Further, the US was perennially suspicious of European intentions and had, as early as 1823, declared that its hemisphere—the Western hemisphere—was closed to the future of European conquest, reconquest or other forms of colonization. When Spain attempted to offload Cuba, the US succinctly clarified that there would be no transfer of any of the territories Europeans occupied then, to another European country—a decision that saved Cuba’s independence, perhaps notwithstanding the intrusive nature of the Platt Amendment, or the fact that the US had acquired the Louisiana Purchase from France, a clear transfer of territory—albeit to a non-European power. To punctuate its point on European intervention and imposition of rule—in this case, monarchical—on the free peoples in the Americas, the US had looked on upon the French-supported (even installed) Austrian Emperor of Mexico, one Maximilien, with no sympathy even as he was executed in 1867. The US withdrew from European affairs at the conclusion of ‘the war to end all wars’—World War I, and passed a raft of resolutions intended to insure its neutrality, isolationism and disdain of war. These included especially the 1928 Kellogg-Briand Pact, acceded to by fifteen countries including South Africa and major European countries; “the first clause outlawed war as an instrument of national policy and the second called upon signatories to settle their disputes by peaceful means.”1 Nonetheless, the US would shortly find itself embroiled in European affairs, protecting convoys sailing from the US to Europe with aid and material from the lend-lease program in the newly-started World War II. Shortly thereafter, it was a victim of Japanese expansion and miscalculation with attacks at Pearl Harbor, and Germany’s declaration of war against the US in support of its Japanese ally ensured that its soldiers were soon fighting in the same killing fields of France. The end of the war found the US firmly in the driving seat of European—and global—affairs, with

1 US Department of State, Office of the Historian, “The Kellogg-Briand Pact, 1928.” Milestones: 1921–1936 (Web). Available from https://history.state.gov/milest ones/1921-1936/kellogg.

104

S. M. MAGU

a new world order, pitting US-led capitalist-democratic nations against the communist-socialist nations led by the USSR. Despite having supported European countries during World War II, in some instances to kick out the Italians and the Germans from Egypt, Libya, Tunisia and Ethiopia, and the Japanese from French Indochina, Burma, the Malay Peninsula, the Philippines and the greater Pacific, often helping re-install the colonial authorities, it was no secret that the US disdained of European imperialism, and the post-World War II period would see tepid, if any, support for continuing the kind of oppression the US had just concluded redacting from its now new BFFs. This was important: the US itself, provisionally in control of the Philippines since its victory over Spain in the Spanish-American War of 1898, had generally worked toward the goal of Filipino independence. Progress was not always smooth, but notable was the US Congress’ 1916 ‘Philippine Autonomy Act’ (or Jones’ Law),2 which was followed by a period of general inaction, characterized by Harding’s 1920s misgivings about Filipino independence given Japan’s actions in the Far East and increasing encroachment on Chinese territories in Manchuria, thus impacting the ‘Open Doors’ policy the US had toward China.3 In keeping with the isolationist, anti-war sentiment, particularly significant after the Great Depression, Congress passed the (vetoed) Tydings-McDuffie Act of 1935, which established the Philippines as a ‘Commonwealth’4 under President Michael Quezon (November 15, 1935).5 Quezon famously and iconically accompanied Gen. Douglas MacArthur, walking ashore to reclaim the Philippines from Japanese occupation during World War II. Ultimately, the Philippines became fully independent in 1946.6 Decolonization would be one of the major features of the interactions at the United Nations, one of the three major international organizations that 2 Yves Boquet, The Philippine Archipelago (Cham: Springer Nature, 2017). 3 Gerhard van den Top, The Social Dynamics of Deforestation in the Philippines: Actions,

Options and Motivations (Copenhagen: Nordic Institute of Asian Studies, 2003). 4 Boquet, The Philippine Archipelago, 2017. 5 Roger M. Thompson, Filipino English and Taglish: Language Switching from Multiple

Perspectives (Philadelphia: John Benjamins Publishing Company, 2003). 6 Charles B. McLane, Soviet Strategies in Southeast Asia: An Exploration of Eastern Policy under Lenin and Stalin (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1966), and Sharon Delmendo, The Star-Entangled Banner: One Hundred Years of America in the Philippines (Quezon: The University of the Philippines Press, 2005).

4

AFRICA HURU! COMPLEX EVENTS—COLD WAR …

105

arose from the ashes of World War II—in addition to the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) or the European Coal and Steel Community (ECSC) incorporating the Benelux countries, Italy, France and West Germany. The United Nations Organization (UN) was the post-war, intergovernmental successor and perhaps more effective organization to the League of Nations (LoN). The United States had failed to join the latter through the non-ratification of the Peace/Treaty of Versailles, the treaty that ended World War I. Interestingly, both the LoN and the UN were the brainchild of the US—Woodrow Wilson and Franklin D. Roosevelt, respectively—even though the US, due to domestic politics and requirements for ratification of international treaties by two-thirds affirmative vote by the Senate, had stayed out of the League, and thus European affairs and hopefully, what it considered purely European mayhem. The groundwork for the United Nations was laid during the 1941 Atlantic Charter, issued jointly by the US (Roosevelt) and the UK (Churchill), committing to, among others, “not to seek territorial expansion,” and restoration of self-government in occupied territories,7 followed by the January 1, 1942 Declaration by the United Nations signed by 26 nations,8 setting the foundation for post-war order, and culminating in the June 1945 signing of the Charter of the United Nations in San Francisco. However, according to the UN itself, the history of the intent of intergovernmental bodies, agreements and cooperation goes further back to the years following the 1859 Battle of Solferino. Henri Dunant’s 1862 accounts of the war, captured in a book titled Un souvenir de Solférino led to the formation of the (International Committee of the) Red Cross (ICRC). The Universal Postal Union (UPU) followed shortly thereafter, as did the International Telecommunications Union (ITU); then came multilateral treaties, conventions and IGOs such as the (First) 1899

7 US Department of State. Office of the Historian, “Milestones 1937–1945 The Atlantic Conference & Charter, 1941” (Web). Available from https://history.state.gov/milest ones/1937-1945/atlantic-conf. 8 Nigel Hamilton, The Mantle of Command: FDR at War, 1941–1942 (New York: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, 2014); J. Simon Rofe, “Prewar and Wartime Postwar Planning: Antecedents to the UN Moment in San Francisco, 1945.” In Dan Plesch and Thomas G. Weiss, Eds., Wartime Origins and the Future United Nations (New York: Routledge, 2015).

106

S. M. MAGU

and (Second) 1907 Hague Conferences (the first establishing the stillfunctional Permanent Court of Arbitration [PCA]), and the 1928 Geneva Protocol to the 1899/1907 Hague Conventions. During World War II, the 1941 Declaration of St. James’ Palace by allies of Great Britain, and 9 European governments in exile articulated the hope for peace, arguing that “the only true basis of enduring peace is the willing cooperation of free peoples in a world in which, relieved of the menace of aggression, all may enjoy economic and social security; it is our intention to work together, and with other free peoples, both in war and peace, to this end.”9 Even though African countries were not represented, language abhorrent of war, encouraging of peace and desirous of freedom would be found in quite a number of other subsequent documents, including the 1941 Atlantic Charter previously alluded to, and issued jointly by FDR and Churchill aboard the U.S.S. Augusta—marking the first time that the term United Nations was used. Reflective of the ultimate post-war arrangements, the signed document was titled ‘Declaration of the United Nations’10 —again, no African nation was party to this declaration— although even issues of sovereignty and equality did seem to apply to only the western countries and not anywhere else. The question of independence and sovereignty was not quite addressed, although the reality of Non-Self-Governing territories and peoples was evident in the structure of the UN (formation of the Trusteeship Council), the Charter of the United Nations itself, and subsequent UN-related documents, treaties and conventions, most notably in the 1948 Universal Declaration of Human Rights. Thus, in 1945, even as the world inaugurated the League’s successor through the United Nations Organization, whose charter was signed by 50 nations at the 1945 San Francisco Conference (and later by Poland), and which entered into force in October, 1945 upon the ratification by 29 signatories, marking October 24th as the formal United Nations Day, ensured that the (fifty) colonies were outside of this new global order. 9 United Nations, “1941: The Declaration of St. James’ Palace.” History of the United Nations. Available from https://www.un.org/en/sections/history-united-nations-charter/ 1941-declaration-st-james-palace/index.html. 10 United Nations, “1942: Declaration of The United Nations.” United Nations. Retrieved 1 December 2018. https://www.un.org/en/sections/history-united-nationscharter/1942-declaration-united-nations/index.html.

4

AFRICA HURU! COMPLEX EVENTS—COLD WAR …

107

Africa was minimally represented at the United Nations by the memberships of Egypt, Ethiopia, Liberia and the Union of South Africa. Clearly, political arrangements, events, disenfranchisement, imprisonment and life under slavery-like conditions in the latter did not represent the consensus position of African countries on colonization or rights of citizens, considering especially that the country was about to declare apartheid the official policy of the minority government. It is also imperative to note that even though a number of African countries were independent, none of them was offered a seat on the UN Security Council—the winners’ club of the World War II. What is perhaps most surprising is the text of Charter of the United Nations itself, which was/is replete with sections, with chapters, articles and subsequent General Assembly and Security Council resolutions supportive of the pursuit of independence and self-rule of colonized territories and peoples. Indeed, the structure of the UN itself was confounding in a Trojan horse kind of way: besides the UN General Assembly, ECOSOC, UN Security Council, ICJ and the UN Secretariat, the sixth main (principal) organ, the Trusteeship Council, comprised of five veto-holding, permanent members of the Security Council, including the Republic of China, which owed its very existence to the US—as did the UK and France, considering its role in their liberation during World War II. The UN Trusteeship Council was to “provide international supervision for 11 Trust Territories that had been placed under the administration of seven member states, and ensure that adequate steps were taken to prepare the Territories for self-government and independence.”11 The Trusteeship Council often considered to have been so successful that it last convened in 1994, although the self-same United Nations reports that there are still 16 Non-Self-Governing Territories today. Back to the Trojan horse element of the Trusteeship Council: the USSR found much delight in occasions (a) assisting colonized countries highlight, indeed magnifying their colonial plight—and the contradictions of democracy, freedom and rights touted by the western major powers at the United Nations, (b) the secondhand treatment of its—African diplomats who were seconded to the ‘hardship duty station’ that was Washington DC—hardship, due to the Jim Crow and segregation laws, 11 United Nations, “Main Organs: Trusteeship Council.” United Nations. Web. https://www.un.org/en/sections/about-un/main-organs/index.html.

108

S. M. MAGU

(c) made a show of supporting newly liberated countries, and those that aspiring to freedom—in Africa and elsewhere—by providing “technical assistance,” badly needed resources, military training and other entrenchment activities in Africa and (d) point out the hypocrisy of democracy given that the US and two of the other P5 members were both democracies and colonial powers, an inconsistent, irreconcilable position. For the decidedly anti-imperialist US, colonialism and, to some extent, the question of the aftermath of slavery were a thorn in its side. It also didn’t help that majority African nations were black, and African Americans in the US were zealously challenging the status quo. When the reckoning came, by way of Nasser’s nationalization of the Suez Canal and the subsequent Suez Canal invasion by Britain, France and Israel, the US’ position was unequivocal, even threatening to the British—the second time in less than sixty years that the US was doing so with regard to British foreign actions—the first being in 1895 over the border between British Guyana and Venezuela.12 More interestingly, the Peoples’ Republic of China (PRC), which a hundred years previously had been almost dismembered by the very self-same European powers, soon replaced the Republic of China (Taiwan) at the UN Security Council. The Trojan therein was that granting independence to the mandate territories was going to undoubtedly brook demands for independence for other occupied—or colonized—countries. In addition, countries in South and East Asia were declaring independence at a rapid clip, even fighting Europeans to grant the colonies independence, as was the case in Indonesia and Vietnam. Africans were learning fast—the period of negotiated liberation was ending, and in several colonies, armed conflict was beginning. From the institutional perspective, the UN Charter provided several avenues for action against colonization. At first glance, the relevant chapters relate to self-government especially of Trustee Territories. For example, Chapter 11 is titled Declaration Regarding Non-Self -Governing Territories, Chapter 12, with its 11 articles (75–85) concerns the International Trusteeship System, as does Chapter 13, articles 86–91, which relate to The Trusteeship Council. After the Charter, the General Assembly and Security Council resolutions, beginning as early as 9th February 1946, promised to keep the matter at the forefront of the offending nations that still controlled colonies in Africa, and their allies. In total, 12 Patrick J. Buchanan, Churchill, Hitler, and “The Unnecessary War”: How Britain Lost Its Empire and the West Lost the World (New York: Crown Publishers, 2008).

4

AFRICA HURU! COMPLEX EVENTS—COLD WAR …

109

there were eighteen (18) General Assembly resolutions on colonialism and associated—sometimes peripheral—rights, such as ‘The Declaration on the Right to Development,’ a precept that might be near impossible in the colonies under the conditions of colonialism. A separate resolution regards the “Third International Decade for the Eradication of Colonialism (2011–2020),” showing that more work was required to achieve true liberation in Africa and elsewhere. Besides the 18 resolutions, the UN Human Rights committees, commissions and councils put forth a number of documents in support of human rights, writ large; they included the Committee on the Elimination of Racial Discrimination, Reports of the Special Rapporteur of the Sub-Commission on Prevention of Discrimination and Protection of Minorities and the Human Rights’ Committee’s General Comment No. 12 on the right to self-determination, CCPR/C/21/Rev.1, pages 10–12.13 A far more potent vehicle in support of Africa’s decolonization efforts was the 1948 Universal Declaration of Human Rights (UDHR), adopted by the UN General Assembly as Resolution 217A on 10th December 1948 at the Palais de Chaillot in Paris, France. It must have not escaped the French and other Europeans that the UDHR was ratified in France, at a time when France still held most of West Africa in colonial status and had resumed war in French Indochina, in a soon-to-be futile attempt to hang on to empire. 48 countries voted for the resolution, 8 abstained and two did not vote; Belgium, France and the United Kingdom were the three European powers with colonies in Africa who voted in favor of the UDHR, alongside three independent African countries: Egypt, Ethiopia and Liberia. Predictably, South Africa did not vote for the resolution. The preamble of the UDHR is especially poignant; the third point reads as follows: “whereas it is essential, if man is not to be compelled to have recourse, as a last resort, to rebellion against tyranny and oppression, that human rights should be protected by the rule of law.”14 The several articles in the UDHR list the freedoms enshrined therein, the term “freedom” appears in 30 instances, although article 2 implies a 13 United Nations, “UN Documentation: Decolonization—Key UN Documents Related to Decolonization”, United Nations Research Documentation—Dag Hammarskjold Library (Web). https://research.un.org/en/docs/decolonization/keydocs. 14 United Nations, “217 (III). International Bill of Human Rights. A Universal Declaration of Human Rights: Preamble.” UN Docs. 10 December 1948. http://undocs.org/ A/RES/217(III), 71.

110

S. M. MAGU

caveat that excludes the notion that the default condition of humanity is independence: “furthermore, no distinction shall be made on the basis of the political, jurisdictional or international status of the country or territory to which a person belongs, whether it be independent, trust, nonself -governing or under any other limitation of sovereignty”15 (my italics). But could individuals achieve “all the rights and freedoms set forth in this Declaration without distinction of any kind”16 when they lived in countries that were denied self-determination? Today, the so-called International Bill of Human Rights encompasses especially the first 30 articles of the UDHR; these articles articulate those universal rights that were denied, by virtue of being colonized, of peoples in Africa—ironically by the same countries that led in drafting the charter. Africa’s Position on UN Anti-colonial Efforts One of the critiques successfully and perennially leveled against the United Nations since its inception—particularly the principal organ that is the Security Council—was that it was, and has always been, a club for the victorious powers of World War II, now lording it over a global architecture of states not reflective of the UN’s formation, its countries—except China—representing slightly over half a billion, or approximately 8.2% of the global population—indeed, including China’s population increases representation to 24.87% of the world population. That aside, the irony inherent in the UN mandate to “eradicate the scourge of war” is selfevident: on the one hand, Nazi Germany and Japan’s expansionist pursuit of resources and Lebensraum tied in neatly with the imperialist tradition of other European (colonial) powers, arguably a professed cause of World War II; on the other hand, after kicking Germany and Japan out of the territories conquered before and during World War II, European colonial powers either denied independence to their colonies, or in some instances, sought to continue, reimpose control, return to prior relationships or in the case of Ethiopia, to impose colonial control where none had previously existed, after roundly Italy—in this instance, an appeal by Ethiopia to the US for closer relationships discouraged Britain and assured Ethiopia’s freedom.

15 United Nations, “217 (III)”, 1948. 16 United Nations, “217 (III)”, 1948, Article 2.

4

AFRICA HURU! COMPLEX EVENTS—COLD WAR …

111

That France and Britain sat on the UN Trusteeship Council is further evidence the cross-purposes at which the United Nations worked. The positions articulated by both the Charter of the UN and the UDHR, and subsequent resolutions at the UN General Assembly bore no resemblance to the reality on the ground. To add complexity to the matter, the recognition of any new country as an independent, sovereign nation necessarily went through the United Nations Security Council, which ordinarily recommended admission, pending a concurring affirmative vote by the UN General Assembly. As such, one might expect that there would be little aid to African countries’ pursuit for liberation, given the composition of the UN Security Council, with two colonial powers and their ally the US. Even in the context of the UNGA resolutions, the US, which did not hold any colonies, either vetoed, or abstained from voting on such resolutions; the omnipresent threat of a veto required the careful navigation of matters at the UN General Assembly. In the context of this potential no-win scenario, sometimes the best of Africa’s efforts, entreaties, resolutions and moral outrage were stymied, or simply passed and the implementation thereof ignored, as is evident with the UN General Assembly Declaration on the Granting of Independence to Colonial Countries and Peoples contained in its resolution 1514 (XV) of 14 December 1960, where 89 countries voted for, 9 abstained (including the colonial powers Belgium, France, Portugal, Spain, United Kingdom and the apartheid regime that was the Union of South Africa. The US, having no colonies also abstained, whereas France, United Kingdom and the United States were veto-holding members of the United Nations. Resolution 1514 was voted upon and passed on 14 December 1960, but the ambivalence in its implementation, or countries simply ignoring it, prompted another vote a year later, resulting in the UN General Assembly Resolution 1654 (XVI) on 27 November 1961. The vote tally for this resolution was 97 for, none against, and 4 abstentions. The case of South Africa, in relation to the United Nations, deserves a mention. Even though apartheid (apartness), South Africa’s legalized racial discrimination system would not be the official policy until 1948, three years after the founding of the UN, the gradually implemented policy quickly found itself on the agenda of the United Nations’ 1st meeting, courtesy of India. Interestingly, India’s request related to the

112

S. M. MAGU

“discriminatory treatment of Indians in the Union of South Africa.”17 In the three-tier apartheid system, Indians were often placed in the second category, below the Whites and ahead of Africans, together with the Afrikaners. Apartheid would be variously condemned through a number of debates at the General Assembly, the Security Council and other key organs, programs and funds, resulting in resolutions, voluntary and compulsory arms and trade embargoes, and other indirect actions. In the subsequent decades, United Nations actions related to South Africa—and other countries who continued to flout both the UN Charter and the UDHR would continue to find place and dialog elsewhere ate the UN: in annual meetings, committees, conferences and in the organs, bodies and programs of the UN, each more transformative. For the Union of South Africa, relief was often to be found in rather unusual places, premised on two important relationships: the relationship with the United States, and with other European countries. Indeed, European countries, as previously shown, flouted the voluntary, the mandated arms embargoes or traded with South Africa. In the case of the US, the Security Council became an important avenue for slow-walking the proposed changes, threatening and on occasion vetoing resolutions on various sanctions against South Africa, for example, the proposed crippling sanctions in 1988 (together with the United Kingdom). Notwithstanding these vetoes, global action and pressure on the US, threats to cut off trade and diplomatic relations and a wind of change on the continent—first spoken of almost 30 years previously, was sweeping apartheid away. Khrushchev: Africa’s Friend/s in High Places… or Enemies of My Enemy? As vocal as the few African countries, assorted independence movements, newly independent Asian countries and the previously alluded to Bandung Conference were, in the quest for the end of colonialism and African liberation, perhaps the best, unwitting ally for the cause of decolonization was the Soviet Union. It was not because the USSR necessarily or particularly cared for the liberation of African countries, or Africans themselves, or the cause for freedom—after all, it was more than effectively efficient in crushing uprisings in the German Democratic Republic (East Germany) 17 United Nations in South Africa, “The UN: Partner in the Struggle against Apartheid”, United Nations. (Web). n.p.

4

AFRICA HURU! COMPLEX EVENTS—COLD WAR …

113

in 1953 and in Hungary in 1956 (ironically, even as the USSR was railing against British, French and Israeli actions against Egypt, and threatening to send its troops to aid Egypt, potentially stoking a nuclear-capable Third World War). The racial and colonial attitudes and practices of the US and its western allies provided the most attractive, and effective target for Soviet propaganda; it also served as a counterweight, helping to tamp down criticism of conditions in the Soviet Union and within its satellite states. The position of the US and its allies was most effectively weakened by the very elements that made the countries “attractive” to future liberation: free press, that reported on conditions and protests such as those in the southern states: Selma, Montgomery, etc. Could the US hope to attract African countries, which looked like all of Montgomery, to its side? The Soviet anti-colonial rhetoric started as early as the end of World War II; long before UNGA Resolutions 1514 and 1560 or Harold MacMillan’s 1960 declaration in South Africa that “the wind of change is blowing through the continent.”18 Borstelmann, for example, paints a longer line that straddled race relations in the US in 1946 and colonialism around the world, especially in Asia and Africa, writing that “the Soviets were swift to tell Third World listeners that the implementation of the Truman Doctrine would inevitably bring American racial discrimination in the wake of American Dollars.”19 Borstelmann adds the findings of scholars and journalists (Harold Isaacs and Richard Deverall), who during their expansive travels to Asia found that “American racial discrimination is one of the facts that identifies us with colonialism in the Asian and African mind. They recognize it for what it is and relate it to their own experience,”20 and the US’ own reported psychological finding that showed the remnants of colonial experiences to be more of a reality than the possibility of Soviet influence.21 The irony of the promise of a better life under democracy is inescapable; indeed, beginning in 1946—for example, Churchill’s Iron Curtain speech (which was delivered in the segregated Fulton College 18 Emyr Jones Parry, “The United Nations—I The Charter and its Operation.” In Satow’s Diplomatic Practice. 7th ed., Ivor Roberts, ed., (Cambridge: Oxford University Press, 2017), 364. 19 Thomas Borstelmann, The Cold War and the Color Line: American Race Relations in the Global Arena (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2001), 70. 20 Borstelmann, The Cold War and the Color Line, 70. 21 Borstelmann, The Cold War and the Color Line, 2001.

114

S. M. MAGU

to a white audience—a mirror of the exact conditions in places such as South Africa, Rhodesia and Kenya) the propaganda war between the US and the Soviet Union intensified and colonial nations became an irresistible prop for the Soviet Union. The question of who the imperialist was continued to suffer a battle of words, with the US releasing publications such as Who Is the Imperialist, a booklet Russia the Reactionary, in addition to the USIA effort to counter soviet disinformation which “distributed 20,000 copies of thirteen different volumes to audiences in Africa and Asia. Selections included Selected Writings on Nature and Liberty, The Political Writings of John Adams, the Autobiography of Benjamin Franklin, and From the Declaration of Independence to the Constitution: The Roots of American Constitutionalism,” 22 a motion picture In Search of Lincoln screened by USIA with large printed photos of Lincoln and Mahatma Gandhi, and the global screening of A picture Story of the United States. And yet, Belmonte notes that “U.S. policymakers knew that communist attacks on American foreign policy were appealing to much of the global audience”23 ; the attraction was in part because “the soviets depicted the United States as hostile to national struggles for liberation. On March 2, 1955, the NSC reported the success of the Soviet campaign to present the U.S. as ‘another Western colonial power,’”24 leading to a reiteration by the USIA of (the necessity of) US support for peoples aiming to attain liberation by peaceful means, and support of newly independent states. Indeed, the battle for the soul of the progressively decolonizing Global South, particularly Africa, was fully in play, and Africa’s unwittingly best advocate, despite having been in power for seven and in charge for two years before his dagger-in-the-side-of-colonialism’s 1960 coup de grace, i.e., Resolution 1514, was Nikita Sergeyevich Khrushchev, the First Secretary of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union, Chairman of the Council of Ministers (Premier). Regarding Resolution 1514 (XV), Perry writes that “the text was considered so important that it was moved by the chairman of the Soviet Council of Ministers (Nikita Khrushchev) himself.”25 In the final iteration of the resolution, although the language

22 Laura A. Belmonte, Selling the American Way: U.S. Propaganda and the Cold War (Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 2008), 99. 23 Belmonte, Selling the American Way, 102. 24 Belmonte, Selling the American Way, 102. 25 Parry, “The United Nations”, 364.

4

AFRICA HURU! COMPLEX EVENTS—COLD WAR …

115

of “inadequacy of…preparedness should never serve as a pretext for delaying independence”26 was added to the final resolution, a year later, nothing had happened. But perhaps in conjunction with, or as a result of events elsewhere, and Khrushchev’s focus on dismantling what the Soviets considered the American imperial empire would continue. The following year, Khrushchev returned to point out the lack of progress, indeed the incompleteness of liberation in Africa and elsewhere, and to publicly shame the western, veto-power holding colonial powers. At the most visible, most public global forum—that is, during the 1961 annual Assembly of the Heads of States and Governments at the United Nations, “upon the request of the USSR, the General Committee recommended to the General Assembly that an item entitled ‘The situation with regard to the implementation of the Declaration on the granting of independence to colonial countries and peoples be included on the agenda of its sixteenth session, in 1961.”27 In a further validation of the position of those countries advocating for independence and the Soviet Union, the adoption of UNGA Resolution 1614 (XVI) by 97-0-4 votes (for, against, abstentions), which established a Special Committee on the Situation with regard to the Implementation of the Declaration on Decolonization,28 comprising of 17, later 24 countries, helped to further chip away at the still prevalent practice of colonialism. As Perry notes, the membership of the committee included 7 former African/Asian colonies, 3 from communist countries (including Yugoslavia, also the place of birth of the Non-Aligned Movement), and the UK and US.29 Whether Khrushchev’s—and the Soviet Union’s position and support of decolonization was genuine or not, or that it was simply a convenient avenue that allowed the Soviet Union, in the midst of crackdowns on democratic and liberation movements in the Warsaw Pact countries, to point to the publicly available information on US and its allies’ colonial activities, to claim some moral high ground in the ideological war that was the Cold War is still worthy of debate. What is clear is that both these

26 Parry, “The United Nations”, 364. 27 United Nations, “Declaration on the Granting of Independence to Colonial Coun-

tries and Peoples.” United Nations Audiovisual Library of International Law (Web), 1. 28 Parry, “The United Nations”, 364–365. 29 Parry, “The United Nations”, 365.

116

S. M. MAGU

factors were important in providing a platform for African countries— as fractured as they were at home on nearly all issues—to highlight the plight of other peoples and nations still under the yoke of colonialism. For whatever it was worth, twenty years after the end of World War II, more than half of Africa’s previously colonized peoples now were free. Friends of Friends in a Fist-Fight The question of why the US did not intervene in Africa, or more importantly, why the US left the management of African affairs to its European partners, countries that insisted on holding onto their crumbling empires to the extent that the US often had to threaten its newly minted minions to abandon some of their more ambitious undertakings, as was the case in the Suez Crisis. A more expansive discussion of US’ lack of involvement in African affairs, even surprise as the number of independent African countries was growing, literally by the day—between 1st and 17th August 1960, 9 African countries gained independence from France— can be found in the scholarship.30 The reasons can be parsed into several explanatory factors. First, after World War II, the US pivoted to Europe, in part to aid with the recovery and rebuilding, to manage the post-war outcomes, troops and the Soviet menace, but also as the most likely place where war might break out again, thus necessitating containment of the Soviet/Communist ideology, influence and threats there. Secondly, the US generally left the management of African affairs to Europeans: this approach is reflected in the fact that the US had no policy toward Africa as late as 1958,31 neither the incentive, nor interest in African affairs or territory, as is evident by its participation in the 1885 Berlin Conference without subsequently claiming colonies (territory). Besides reluctance in imperialism, the entrenchment of European powers in Africa seemed to help explain US disinterest in the continent. Thirdly, even where US interests were directed at other countries and regions, traditionally Latin America, China, Japan and the Far East at the turn of the twentieth century, and gradually to the Middle East, and the Pacific region, Africa generally never featured strategically or economically—save for the Sahel region—due to its geographic proximity to

30 See for example the discussion, and chapter, by Stephen Magu, Great Powers and US Foreign Policy towards Africa (New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2019), 55–85. 31 Magu, US and Great Powers Foreign Policy Towards Africa, 2019.

4

AFRICA HURU! COMPLEX EVENTS—COLD WAR …

117

Europe, and cultural affinity to the Middle East. Even where Soviet and Chinese communist influences were likely to spread, south, southeast and East Asia were the more likely targets, given the outcomes in the PRC versus ROC, Korea and Vietnam. Granted, there were proxy-dances that involved Somalia/Ethiopia, and an exceedingly complex waltz involving Cubans, Soviets, South Africans and Israelis in southern Africa, but it was unlikely that those challenges would spread. Illustrating the significance of other, non-African regions, within ten years of the end of World War II, the US had just concluded a war in Korea. In the next few years, it had advisors on the ground in South Vietnam, supporting a democratic, albeit corrupt regime, and increasing its participation in what was initially war of Vietnamese independence, waged by a thoroughly miffed Vietnamese people who, having fought against the Japanese (and therefore on the same side as the French) declared independence from both. The fourth reason thus dovetails with the third: in terms of proximity both to the US and its vital interests, Africa was farther removed; in addition, the Soviet Union was especially distant from Africa—the continent serving as a poster-child for western imperialism rather than a viable competing ground. The Soviet Union did not show sustained interest in the continent except where such interest served to generally frustrate the US. Fifth, as long as Europe controlled and ‘adequately’ managed African affairs, and facilitated access to its abundance of natural and vital resources, e.g., uranium, through trading companies such as the Belgian company, Union Minière du Haut-Katanga, the US was happy to let Europe sustain, for a period, the illusion of empire. It was also practical to recognize that the US necessarily stood better chances of having such access if control of African countries remained with European colonial powers rather than the likes of Nkrumah, who had quickly begun cavorting with China, USSR and the likes of Tito. It was a most mutually beneficial self-sustaining feedback loop: Europeans relied on the US nuclear umbrella for protection from the threat of Soviet invasion and communism, while the US could access critical resources as long as Europeans were in control. Finally, the US had a significant, and by all accounts, a most inconvenient “African problem”—broadly, relating to the history of its treatment of its minorities—in places where it had conquered dissimilar races, but more presciently, its several million population of ‘second-class’ citizens: these included especially African Americans, but also increasingly,

118

S. M. MAGU

Native Americans. If the US were to support Africa’s liberation and selfdetermination, that might then imply, nay require, a denunciation of the racially-motivated laws and practices such as Jim Crow Laws in force in the American south and general discrimination elsewhere, and in place thereof, necessarily enact civil rights. Considering the failure of the American Colonization Society’s project instituted more than a hundred years previously, of repatriating freed African slaves to Liberia, support for African liberation portended unintended consequences. In this context, the US’ ‘Africa problem’ insured that the racial politics of the US would continue, even though as previously seen, they provided an endless source of fodder for Soviet propaganda, inroads into Africa, and fervent public shaming episodes at the United Nations. Internal domestic politics challenged the possibility of enacting civil rights legislation, even as such politics wreaked havoc on the global stage—and for an outcome almost predetermined, in hindsight it might appear that the US traded its best opportunity to attract newly nations to itself by failing to stand up for the very values it espoused—at home and on the global stage. Africa then, in the context of the new global order that the US was driving, found great disadvantage occasioned by the US’ relationship with Europe and its own domestic policies, even where interest in the affairs of the countries might have percolated, even found sympathy not as a mere global geopolitical expediency, but in pursuit of American ideals of liberation. “American diplomats and visitors had almost no significant contacts with Africans—outside of interactions with the uniquely American problem of ‘African Americans,’ even as late as the 1940s, admitting privately their nearly total ignorance of what they called ‘native issues.’ Sympathetic with the white officials whose segregated society they shared there, white Americans tended instead to view Africa through European eyes.”32 The few future African luminaries who made it to the US, such as Nkrumah, were able to articulate their ideas of African freedom and panAfricanism in like circles: in the issues of the civil rights denied of African Americans. It was no surprise then, that the newly independent African countries quickly gravitated toward the Soviet Union, a superpower that promised a better path, but also offered an authoritarian template for government, which most of the African countries quickly adopted with the pretext of national unity and cohesion.

32 Borstelmann, The Cold War and the Color Line, 71.

4

AFRICA HURU! COMPLEX EVENTS—COLD WAR …

119

‘Green Grass in the Snake’: The African Split on Africa’s Positions on Apartheid The complex machinations of western powers at the United Nations were an art in double-speak, in duplicity, diplomatic cunning and as some African peoples will contend, involved ‘speaking out of both sides of one’s mouth, like the devil.’ Colonial powers ably represented at the UN were simultaneously declaring the desirability of freedom for all peoples, through the UN Charter, the UDHR and subsequent covenants, while retaining ambiguity as to the status of the subjects, or non-citizens in the colonies, while simultaneously denying freedom, re-invading the newly forcibly, even perilously retrieved colonies—ironically, often with the help of colonized peoples from other areas of the world, for example Kenya Colony African soldiers fighting in Burma—from the jaws fascism, Kokutai and other nationalisms, issuing declaration of human rights for all peoples, without extending the freedoms they themselves desired those in the colonies. Even more tellingly, these same colonists were lording it over the very institutions whose primary objective was to assure eventual liberation, independence, e.g., the Trusteeship Council and the UN Security Council approval for admission of new member states to the UN. Granted, there was ultimately the goal of liberation, ‘when conditions in the colonies were right’—but in a neat turn of tricks, the police were also the judge, jury and executioner. Ironically, the same colonizers would (hopefully) prepare the colonies for self-independence, and when they adjudged them ready, freedom would come. Naturally, these arrangements were the source of Africa’s, and increasingly, Asian countries now becoming independent, disquiet; sovereign nations were increasingly vocal in pointing out the hypocrisy, and advocating on behalf of colonized peoples’ struggle for freedom, investigation of some of the most egregious transgressions visited on African peoples in the forms of gulags, mass incarceration, lack of education and political disenfranchisement. Everywhere on the continent where colonialism thrived, some version of violations to the right to self-determination issued; yet, the most illustrative case is that of South Africa, over the issue of apartheid. As more African countries became independent, to engage, or not, with apartheid, provided most surprising grounds for contested, heated debate among the Heads of States and Governments. The Union of South Africa’s socially governed customs, which kept the different races separate, was codified after the 1948 general election, which was won by the National Party under Daniel Malan.

120

S. M. MAGU

The National/ist Party moved a number of laws through parliament, to include the much-maligned Group Areas Act—which, according to Mandela, were “the foundation of racial apartheid […] each racial group could own land, occupy premises and trade only in its own separate area.”33 Apartheid laws were enacted a mere fifteen years before the formation of the OAU; apartheid was a reflection of the class divisions that had existed in many of the colonies, often to a lesser degree, but intended to separate—and especially contain—Africans, to the extent that they could not effectively challenge minority domination. The ‘separateness’ extended to lack of programs, training and funding in areas of socioeconomic development, education, property ownership and participation in government—almost uniformly, across colonial Africa. Now that the countries were independent, the early challenge—one that presented a test for OAU member states’ position on the policy—arose: engage with apartheid South Africa, whose sovereignty was recognized internationally despite its domestic, economic and racial policies, or confront the government and its practice/s? Adding to the challenge of influencing the direction of matters in South Africa, in a referendum to rid itself of the relics of ‘colonialism’ and imperial control, in a 1960 whites-only referendum the Union of South Africa voted to become the Republic of South Africa.34 Doing the Same Thing Over…West African Perspectives The stand taken toward the Republic of South Africa’s apartheid policy was baffling, although in context, trying a different approach (dialog) other than that which had not worked (unflinching, unrequited, even armed opposition) in the 1960s seemed like a rational, logical approach. For the frontline states (see next section), which were either directly impacted by apartheid (economically, or geographically), it made sense that they were highly involved—either in support or in opposition— even as they were accused, for example, Tanzania, of being influenced by communism (a far worse ideology) or of dominating discussions and approaches toward apartheid. That several African leaders, even in the face of the increasingly consensus positions and actions to isolate and stifle 33 Nelson Mandela, Long Walk to Freedom: The Autobiography of Nelson Mandela (New York: Little, Brown and Company, 1995), 122. 34 Hermann Giliomee, The Last Afrikaner Leaders: A Supreme Test of Power (Cape Town: Tafelberg, 2012).

4

AFRICA HURU! COMPLEX EVENTS—COLD WAR …

121

apartheid while simultaneously supporting freedom fighters and liberation struggles, continued to propose, and engage in diplomatic overtures toward South Africa, spoke to the possibility of an objective evaluation of the strategies and approaches, and the likelihood of their success. Once the dam broke and Félix Houphouët-Boigny publicly expressed support for dialog with the apartheid regime, other African countries followed suit. Houphouët-Boigny, the so-called Sage of Africa, had a thoroughly French grounding: he served as a Deputy in the French Parliament, a Minister in several cabinets and portfolios, ultimately becoming the Ivory Coast’s (current: Republic of Côte d’Ivoire’s) president on independence in 1960. As part of the Communauté française (French African Community), the 12 countries were free to choose independence (separation with France) or to join the Franco-African community. Houphouët-Boigny made clear his preference, leading to the now wellworn statement by his Guinean arch-rival, Ahmed Sékou Touré preferring “freedom in poverty over wealth in slavery.”35 Regionally, HouphouëtBoigny was the quintessential ‘saboteur’ who opposed everything that he did not start, anything that had continental unity written all over it, everything that did not seem to advance his own position, and that of the French, that provided an alternative vision of Africa, the rise of rival centers of power in West Africa, and anyone that did not support his agenda, from Ghana to Mali to Nigeria. An excellent example is seen in his opposition to perceived rising prominence of Senegal: he boycotted the Inter-African Conference of 1958 to discuss Francophone states’ federation, and further sabotaged the resulting IAC federation by convincing Upper Volta (Burkina Faso), Dahomey (Benin) and Niger to withdraw from the Mali Federation and join the Ivory Coast-led Conseil de l’Entente, ostensibly, to share public services, provide a solidarity fund to members (it provided 90% funding) and fund development projects at low interest (Côte d’Ivoire provided 70% of the loans), hastening the Federation’s collapse in 1960.36 The collapse quickly led to Mali’s independence and the formation of the Ghana-Guinea-Mali Union (1960), the nucleus of the United States of Africa—a grouping thought to be most radical, and inclusive of 35 Bridgette Kasuka, ed., Prominent African Leaders Since Independence (Dar es Salaam: New Africa Press, 2013), 78. 36 Gregory Mann, From Empires to NGOs in the West African Sahel : The Road to Nongovernmentality (New York: Cambridge University Press, 2015).

122

S. M. MAGU

Houphouët-Boigny’s adversaries: Nkrumah, Modibo Keïta and Sékou Touré.37 In 1961, he helped found the Union africaine et malgache (UAM)—or the African and Malagasy Union, which Senegal joined, despite its strained relations with Houphouët-Boigny. In 1965, in a move aimed at challenging OAU’s founding and goals, the UAM was transformed into the Organisation africaine et malgache de coopération économique et culturelle (OAMCE)—or the African and Malagasy Organization of economic and cultural cooperation.38 The organization’s subservience to the French led to accusations of neo-colonialism, with half the members withdrawing their participation. Houphouët-Boigny helped found the Economic Community of West Africa (ECWA), a grouping of primarily French-speaking West African states—under the proposition of elements of his foreign policy dubbed ‘Françafrique.’ ECWA was formed as a response to the formation of the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS) by Nigeria. Ultimately, both organizations would merge into ECOWAS in 1975.39 But even as he interfered, intervened, frustrated the OAU agenda and proposed dialog with the likes of South Africa, Houphouët-Boigny was not averse to interfering in the affairs of countries in the region; between independence and his death in 1993, he gave ardent support to many rebellions. In the Congo crises, he supported (the French-supported, OAU/Africa-opposed) Moïse Tshombe, eventually boycotting the OAU 1967 meeting in Kinshasa, interfered in Guinea, Ghana, Benin, Burkina Faso, Liberia and in Nigeria, he supported Biafra’s secession war, although

37 Michael O. Anda, International Relations in Contemporary Africa (Lanham: University Press of America, 2000). 38 Terry M. Mays and Mark W. Delancey, Historical Dictionary of International Organizations in Sub-Saharan Africa. 2nd ed. (Lanham: The Scarecrow Press, Inc., 2002); Magdaline Mbong Mai and Jules-Clement Mba, “Bilateral Trade Collaboration or Not? The Case of Africa and Latin America Between 1996 and 2015).” In Sabella Ogbobode Abidde, Ed., Africa, Latin America, and the Caribbean: The Case for Bilateral and the Caribbean: The Case for Bilateral and Multilateral Cooperation (Lanham: Lexington Books, 2018). 39 Daudi Ballali, Pierre Dhonte, G. Terrier and Stéphane Cossé, Economic Trends in Africa: The Economic Performance of Sub-Saharan African Countries, IMF Working Paper WP/94/109 (Washington, DC: IMF, 1994); Bridgette Kasuka, ed., Prominent African Leaders Since Independence (Dar es Salaam: New Africa Press, 2013).

4

AFRICA HURU! COMPLEX EVENTS—COLD WAR …

123

it did not recognize Biafra as a country, he hosted Lt. Col. OdumegwuOjukwu, the Biafran ‘president,’ who fled to exile in Côte d’Ivoire.40 Côte d’Ivoire’s—or perhaps Houphouët-Boigny’s—position, and conduct around Africa, is especially intriguing, considering that its actions toward rapprochement with South Africa flew in the face of its global commitments, including ratifying the UN’s Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Racial Discrimination (by State Parties) in 1973, which, among other things, requires states “not to sponsor, defend or support racial indiscrimination by any individuals or organizations.”41 If this position was inconsistent with its regional leadership, continental expectations and global commitments, considering it in the context of Houphouët-Boigny’s other pronouncements, positions and activities shows that perhaps his opposition to armed confrontation with South Africa, and his preference for diplomatic engagement instead, reflected western (read French) approaches, informed by the complex global geopolitical power plays, his own unabashedly pro-French views, hostility to (or non-cooperation with African countries)—alleging, for example, that he was afraid to fly (primarily to OAU meetings) but his aviophobia seemed to vanish over the Mediterranean,42 and he had no qualms, in the company of Senghor and Diori, and under de Gaulle’s mentorship, in dissociating themselves with the ‘radical’ African leaders who favored African political union.43 Ultimately, because of, and persuaded by the examples of the likes of Houphouët-Boigny, other countries found the space to pursue their own version of a foreign policy marked by cooperation with, or at least the absence of hostility toward the apartheid regime. The South African Democracy Trust notes that “countries like Liberia and Senegal

40 Mutuma Ruteere, “Liberia.” In David P Forsythe, Ed., Encyclopedia of Human Rights, Volume 1—Afghanistan-Democracy and Right to Participation (New York: Oxford University Press, 2009); David J Francis, The Politics of Economic Regionalism: Sierra Leone in ECOWAS: Sierra Leone in ECOWAS (New York: Routledge, 2008). 41 Human Rights Watch, Côte D’Ivoire—The New Racism: the Political Manipulation

of Ethnicity in Côte d’Ivoire, vol. 13, no. 6 (A) (Washington, DC: Human Rights Watch, 2001), 12. 42 Godfrey Mwakikagile, Africa After Independence: Realities of Nationhood with Photos (Johannesburg: Continental Press, 2009). 43 Sabelo J. Ndlovu-Gatsheni, “Pan-Africanism and the International System.” In Tim Murithi, Ed., Handbook of Africa’s International Relations (New York: Routledge, 2014).

124

S. M. MAGU

engaged in secret diplomacy with South Africa.”44 The engagement was in part urged by Felix Houphouet-Boigny, based on deliberations with Vorster, who promised to receive African leaders as equals, but had no plans to alter the apartheid policy. Other countries such as Ghana, Mauritius, although receptive to the possibility of engaging with South Africa, were ambivalent while the likes of Nigeria, Liberia, Cameroon and Tanzania were outright opposed to any type of engagement. Yet even as unpalatable as some countries found Houphouët-Boigny’s proposal, it was discussed at the 1971 OAU Foreign Ministers’ meeting—it appeared that Houphouët-Boigny did secure the interest of Senegalese leader, Sedar Senghor, to ‘dialog’ with South Africa.45 Frontline States: Malawi’s Versus Regional States’ Position on Apartheid Malawi’s case was slightly more complex. Its rapprochement with South Africa is thought to have arisen from a number of reasons and sources: a shared colonial history and British influence on both, geographical proximity, a pro-western (as opposed to the socialist leaning of Tanzania, for instance) and the significant trade dependency—Malawi’s trade, mining and investment was dependent to a large extent on South Africa. It was somewhat only mildly surprising that Malawi undertook a number of initiatives toward South Africa that not only distanced it from its northern neighbor, Tanzania, but also gave South Africa a lifeline, even a moral victory. In 1966, South African officials visited Malawi to celebrate its independence, while three Malawi Ministers visited South Africa in 1967 and signed a trade agreement and marking the establishment of diplomatic relations.46 Malawi also benefitted militarily from South African support, including a having a Military Attaché to South Africa. Meetings followed, between South African Ministers and Malawi government functionaries, with Malawi as a potential gateway into other African countries (e.g., Madagascar), culminating with a 1970 state visit by South African Prime Minister B.J. Vorster to Malawi, the first to an independent African state a visit by a South African leader. Banda later visited South Africa 44 South African Democracy Education Trust, The Road to Democracy in South Africa: 1970–1980 (Cape Town: University of South Africa, 2006), 620. 45 SADT, The Road to Democracy in South Africa, 2006. 46 Roger Pfister, Apartheid South Africa and African States: From Pariah to Middle

Power, 1961–1994 (New York: Tauries Academic Studies, 2005), 40.

4

AFRICA HURU! COMPLEX EVENTS—COLD WAR …

125

in August 1971, in a reciprocal first. Regarding the African position on, and opposition to Banda‘s outreach to the apartheid government, Banda and his government suggested that the OAU was “vocal, emotional” and objected to the “militancy”47 that it espoused, arguing that it was more useful to view apartheid South Africa as a potential economic partner of tomorrow. More nuanced perspectives have emerged, to explain Banda— and Malawi’s—enamored relationship with South Africa. Ingham, for example, reflects on the relationship between Banda and Milton Obote of Uganda in the context of apartheid South Africa, writing that Obote “was convinced that, at heart, Banda did not support apartheid, but that (Banda) had reached the conclusion that there was little the rest of Africa could do about it.”48 Thus, while rejecting the position itself, Obote “acknowledged that it was honestly held.”49 Curiously, Banda continued to attend the British Commonwealth meetings, even in the face of the other members’ positions. Yet upon its ‘acceptance’ in the 1969 Lusaka Conference of mainly East and Central African nations, “only Malawi appeared not to have joined in the acclaim.”50 As the disagreements on what approach to take persisted in the first decade of the OAU’s existence, the Lusaka Manifesto (or the Manifesto on Southern Africa), reflecting consensus deliberations by the Fifth Summit Conference of East and Central African States, reiterated a number of globally accepted positions—at least by the UN Charter, and the UDHR. Among others, the Lusaka Manifesto was a restatement of commitments to clarification of the group’s purposes, sought to reaffirm the (universality) of human equality of all men without regard to racial, gender or other common classes of differences (also highlighted in the UDHR), right to self-determination and control their destiny, recognized shortcomings but restatement of “hostility towards the colonial and racial

47 Jamie Miller, An African Volk: The Apartheid Regime and Its Search for Survival (New York: Oxford University Press, 2016). 48 Kenneth Ingham, Obote: A Political Biography, (New York: Routledge, 1994), 95 49 Ingham, Obote, 95. 50 Richard Hall, “The Lusaka Manifesto.” African Affairs, vol. 69, no. 275 (April 1, 1970), 178.

126

S. M. MAGU

discrimination”51 practiced in South Africa (pp. 67) and reflected on similarity of the conditions in South Africa to those in Angola, Mozambique, Angola, Rhodesia, South West African and the Republic of South Africa. It emphasized that the hostility was driven merely by control of ‘white people,’ rather due to ‘systems of minority control’ and ‘doctrines of human inequality,’ and reasserted that citizens of those countries were Africans, regardless of color, and liberation not based on reverse racism.52 Notably, and in a nod to other paths that had been increasingly suggested as more viable route to achieving liberation and thus the end of apartheid, the Lusaka Manifesto was clear on its commitment to liberation, but also to openness to negotiation as a way to achieve the goal. On the objective of liberation as thus defined, we can neither surrender nor compromise. We have always preferred and we still prefer, to achieve it without physical violence. We would prefer to negotiate rather than destroy, to talk rather than kill. We do not advocate violence; we advocate an end to the violence against human dignity which is now being perpetrated by the oppressors of Africa. If peaceful progress to emancipation were possible, or if changed circumstances were to make it possible in the future, we would urge our brothers in the resistance movements to use peaceful methods of struggle even at the cost of some compromise on the timing of change.53

Besides the language of non-violent achievement of liberation goals, an interesting and decidedly moderated position especially among the frontline states and in the context of Ingham’s view on Obote‘s understanding of Banda‘s position and approaches to dis/engagement with apartheid, the 1969 Lusaka Manifesto attracted significant attention around the world. This attention ranged from its publication in Britain’s leading newspapers (paid for by Zambia), to endorsement by the OAU and the United Nations, to receiving “a mixed reaction in South Africa.”54

51 N. M. Shamuyarira, “The Lusaka Manifesto on Southern Africa, Lusaka 14th–16th April 1969.” African Review, vol. 1, no. 1, (March, 1971), 67. 52 Shamuyarira, “The Lusaka Manifesto on Southern Africa”, 66–9; see also: Kenneth W. Grundy, Confrontation and Accommodation in Southern Africa: The Limits of Independence (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1973). 53 Shamuyarira, “The Lusaka Manifesto on Southern Africa”, 69. 54 Hall, “The Lusaka Manifesto”, 178.

4

AFRICA HURU! COMPLEX EVENTS—COLD WAR …

127

Ten years later, at the 1979 Lusaka, Zambia’s Commonwealth Heads of Governments (CHOG) meeting, the CHOGs reflected on the Lusaka Manifesto. In the new declaration, they referred to the 1971 Declaration of Commonwealth Principles in Singapore, and the 1977 London statement on apartheid in Sport. With these as background documents, they issued the Lusaka Declaration of the Commonwealth on Racism and Racial Prejudice. In part, the declaration reaffirmed the UN principle of “faith in the inherent dignity and worth of the human person,” reiterated the right to live freely, non-subjection to perpetuation of prejudice or racial discrimination, equality and justice before the law, protection from discrimination, rejection of apartheid, racial segregation, determination to work toward eradicating apartheid, protection against incitement to racial hatred and discrimination, non-discrimination, protection of children, diversity in the commonwealth and the special circumstances of minorities, immigrants, workers and refugees, and their solemn duty to work together to implement positive measures to eliminate racism, as well as public information and education in support thereof.55 Penguins in Madagascar Elsewhere among the states closest to the colonies of Mozambique, Angola and South Africa, the relationship between Madagascar and South Africa was complex and was informed in part by their second-class (rank) citizens, the Coloureds, as well as historical relations between the two countries. According to Davis, 1948’s formalization of apartheid and the 1950 Population Registration Act, Coloreds were considered entirely South African, as they could no longer trace their heritage to England or Holland, having had lost links with societies in “Madagascar, India and South East Asia from which many of their ancestors were brought to South Africa mainly as slaves in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries by the Dutch East India Company,”56 and also “descendants of relationships between White and Black People, the descendants Malay slaves brought from Southeast Asia and descendants of the Indigenous Khoi and San.”57 55 Commonwealth Secretariat, “Lusaka Declaration on Racism and Racial Prejudice”. The Commonwealth Heads of Government Secretariat. 7 August 1979 (Web). 56 Geoffrey V. Davis, Voices of Justice and Reason: Apartheid and Beyond in South African Literature (Amsterdam: Rodopi B. V., 2003), 87–88. 57 Davis, Voices of Justice and Reason, 88.

128

S. M. MAGU

Madagascar’s position on apartheid—implicit, if not explicit support— was rather curious, considering that the French labeled colonized peoples fighting for independence after the conclusion of World War II—in Algeria, Madagascar and Indochina—as “pro-Soviet communists,”58 a designation that allowed the French to call upon American aid—Madagascar alone suffered close to 40,000 deaths in the conflict against the French in 1947. The expectation then might have been that the Malagasy would be sympathetic to those fighting wars of liberation. After its own liberation experience, driven by the desire for freedom, membership and admission into major global norms-regulating bodies, and ratification of major instruments toward assuring human dignity, continued to occupy Madagascar. Madagascar also made overtures to apartheid South Africa, inviting the government to propose ways to exploit minerals that were to be found in abundance in Madagascar; this followed a number of visits and discussions in investment, insurance and mining companies.59 Other connections and outreach included the proposal for collaboration in developing tourism in the southern Africa region, which took place in Madagascar in 1969. Pfister suggests that the Madagascar-South Africa connection was much more tenuous compared to that of Malawi, but still gave South Africa another potential avenue into independent African countries.60 Yet reliably, and together with other countries in the region that were especially proximate to South Africa—including Malawi, and instructively, the land-locked Lesotho, the sandwiched-betweenPortuguese-Mozambique-and-South Africa, Madagascar, informed by proximity and economic dependence, continued to advocate for dialog with South Africa, going as far as bucking the general mood among other African countries, on a continental level, by voting against adoption of the Tanzania-authored proposal, ‘The principles of the OAU, the Lusaka Manifesto, Dialogue and future Strategy of Africa’ at the 1971 OAU Summit.61

58 Thomas Borstelmann, The Cold War and the Color Line: American Race Relations in the Global Arena (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2001), 58. 59 Pfister, Apartheid South Africa and African States, 2005. 60 Pfister, Apartheid South Africa and African States, 2005. 61 Zdenek Cervenka, ˇ “The Organization of African Unity and the Policy of “Détente”

in Southern Africa.” Law and Politics in Africa, Asia and Latin America, vol. 8, no. 3/4 (Quartal, 1975).

4

AFRICA HURU! COMPLEX EVENTS—COLD WAR …

129

Elsewhere: The Arab League’s Anti-apartheid Positions The Arab League (formally, League of Arab States), formed in Egypt in March, 1945 by Saudi Arabia, Lebanon, the Emirate of Transjordan, the Kingdoms of Egypt and Iraq, and Syria, preceded both the United Nations by a few months, and the OAU by almost two decades, and by 1963, had significant experience in advocacy on regional issues. The goal of its founding was “the promotion of political, economic, social, and cultural cooperation among Arab-Speaking countries […] to end European colonial rule in the Arab world,”62 primarily afflicting Transjordan and Syria. A further goal was of “politically unifying the Arab World,”63 which was never achieved, despite the ultimately abortive Egypt/Syrian merger into the United Arab Republic in 1958. Page and Sonnenbaum hold that “much of the Arab League’s time and energy since the 1950 s has been directed toward defending Palestinian rights, and it was largely responsible for the creation of the Palestine Liberation Organization,”64 and supported Algeria (Algerian National Liberation front) against France in the Algerian War of Independence. The Arab League primarily focused on the challenges relating to the post-Ottoman Empire arrangements in the Middle East, ranging from semi-autonomy (Egypt), to Mandate Territories (as opposed to the more formal versions of colonies), to the legacies of the Sykes-Picot Agreement and the Balfour Declaration, the question of Palestine, and shortly after its formation, a thorny issue: the UN Partition Plan, accomplished through UN Resolution 181 (1947), almost universally opposed by the Arab countries. This also related to the question of the right of Israel to exist versus the rights of the Palestinians, particularly as increasingly, Israel, with the support of western powers, encroached on the partition lines, blockaded Palestinians within Gaza and a shrinking West Bank, restricted movement, put down insurrections, constructed (illegal) settlements and increasingly concentrated Palestinians in what is often compared to apartheid South Africa’s Bantustans, townships and ghettos. The subtle shift in the Arab League’s focus reflected the very purposes leading to the formation of the African Union; the single most uniting 62 Melvin Eugene Page and Penny M. Sonnenburg, Eds., Colonialism: An International, Social, Cultural, and Political Encyclopedia, Volume 1 (Santa Barbara: ABC-CLIO, 2003), 23. 63 Page and Sonnenburg, Colonialism, 24. 64 Page and Sonnenburg, Colonialism, 24.

130

S. M. MAGU

issue for both the Arab League and the future Organization of African Unity, was liberation of—of colonies in Africa, of Palestine and more generally, of the right to self-determination. Of course, there were lingering doubts, suspicions about the cultural dissimilarity of the Arab nations and African countries, in no way helped by the perception that North Africa was not in Africa (at least culturally, religiously, linguistically and ethnically), spurred on by the emerging narrative of ‘Sub-Saharan Africa’ versus Sahel/Middle East and North Africa. Nonetheless, over time, membership of the Arab League with African members, increased to 22, including the State of Palestine. Approximately half of the members, i.e., 10, are geographically located in Africa; the inclusion of the 5 North Africa/Sahel countries is self-evident, but the list also includes Sudan, Mauritania, the restive state of Somalia and Comoros. At the formation of the OAU, the Sahel countries and Sudan were independent and also members of the Arab League, while the rest joined as recently as 1994 (Comoros), and Eritrea as an observer from 2003. A description of the conditions under which Palestinians increasingly found themselves living under illuminates the similarities to colonialism and apartheid. Kasrils holds that “Palestinians within the West Bank and Gaza Strip are besieged and imprisoned under the most onerous conditions, suffering hardships and methods of control that are far worse than anything black South Africans faced during the most dreadful days of apartheid,”65 further describing the territories as “enclosed prison ghettos under brutal military occupation, siege and collective punishment.”66 Abowd writes of Jerusalem as constitutive of “enforced separation (hafrada in Hebrew, infisaal in Arabic),”67 with Israel having “shaped the lives of Arabs and Jews” since the beginning of the struggle, resulting in “a prescribed social order of apartness between Palestinians and Israelis across the entire country,”68 the lack of definition of Israel as a colonial authority (merely, illegal occupation of East Jerusalem and the West Bank), but Abowd notes that [beyond] “the discriminatory 65 Ronnie Kasrils, “Birds of a Feather: Israel and Apartheid South Africa—Colonialism of a Special Type.” In Ilan Pappé, Ed., Israel and South Africa: The Many Faces of Apartheid (London: Zed Books, 2015), 33. 66 Kasrils, “Birds of a Feather”, 33. 67 Thomas Philip Abowd, Colonial Jerusalem: The Spatial Construction of Identity and

Difference in a City of Myth, 1948–2012 (Syracuse: Syracuse University Press, 2014), 4. 68 Abowd, Colonial Jerusalem, 4.

4

AFRICA HURU! COMPLEX EVENTS—COLD WAR …

131

bylaws of Jewish-only kibbutzim, neighborhoods, or settlements”69 that these are hallmarks of colonialism. More significantly, Israeli activities, unlike British management of the Palestine Mandate, were hallmarks thereof: “the self-described Jewish state built on earlier, pre-state efforts to transform and claim the country for the exclusive benefit of Jewish communities in Palestine and abroad.”70 Shaped by the experiences in the region, and similarities with the concurrent issues the OAU was advocating for, the Arab League showed commitment and credibility and partnership to the cause for African liberation particularly in apartheid South Africa. The Arab world’s “struggles against imperialism, colonialism, neo-colonialism, Zionism, racism and apartheid”71 supported, even reflected, OAU’s goals of isolating South Africa, through economic boycotts of the trio of egregious offenders including South Africa, Rhodesia and Portugal, cutting off oil supplies to the apartheid regime, through active consolidation of Afro-Arab cooperation and support for anti-colonial struggles.72 In part, the Arab world actions were intended to shore up the perceived “Arab indifference to serious economic difficulties including balance of payments deficits faced by many poor African countries,”73 but also by the perceived attempt at domination of OAU institutions by Arab leaders, beginning especially with Egypt’s Nasser and his growing role in the Arab world, highlighting his importance to the OAU. There was a further intersection between the OAU and the Arab League, produced, ironically externally, by the shared interests, cooperation and military alliance between Israel and South Africa, even as both countries faced persistent, unrelenting pressure, denunciations and boycotts on the global stage, aimed at forcing a change in the treatment of Palestinians and Africans, respectively. Israel, argues Lissoni, “was not only responsible for selling arms to and sharing nuclear secrets with apartheid South Africa (which Pretoria used, in turn, to continue to oppress the

69 Abowd, Colonial Jerusalem, 4. 70 Abowd, Colonial Jerusalem, 7. 71 Adeoye A. Akinsanya, “Afro-Arab Cooperation and North Africa.” In Hamdy A.

Hassan, Ed., Regional Integration in Africa: Bridging the North—Sub-Saharan Divide (Pretoria: Africa Institute of South Africa, 2011), 76. 72 Akinsanya, “Afro-Arab Cooperation and North Africa”, 2011. 73 Akinsanya, “Afro-Arab Cooperation and North Africa”, 76.

132

S. M. MAGU

Black majority), it also played a significant role in sustaining one of the very cornerstones of apartheid.”74 The Arab League’s conflictual relationship often spilled onto Africa—in part because it often involved an OAU member (Egypt) and impacted the role that Israel vis-à-vis apartheid South Africa, but even more broadly, reflected global geopolitics affecting a Non-Aligned Movement member. In solidarity with Egypt and the Arab League, After the 1973 Yom Kippur war, which resulted in Israel occupying Egypt’s Sinai peninsula, the OAU resolved for all members to sever diplomatic ties with Israel—all countries except the usual suspects— Malawi, Swaziland, Lesotho and Mauritius complied, but others would re-establish ties in the 1980s—Liberia, Zaire and the Ivory Coast, while urging ‘positive neutrality.’75 Notwithstanding, there have been useful contrasts drawn, in assessing the OAU’s actions toward resisting apartheid, especially among the Frontline States, against the actions taken by the Arab League to support (or not) the Palestinian cause, with state interests trumping pan-Arabism, piecemeal approach toward dealing with Israel (e.g., the Camp David Accords of 1978 and Israeli-Egypt accords, the rapprochement with Jordan), and the general absence of a ‘system’ to confront Israel—for African Frontline States, despite the complicity of Swaziland, Lesotho, Malawi and Madagascar, freedom fighters were armed, trained and sheltered in countries as disparate as Tanzania, Zaire, Zambia and even Libya, while liberation organizations including the African National Congress (ANC) and its military arm, uMkhonto we Sizwe (MK), the pan-Africanist Congress (PAC), the South African Communist Party, (SACP) and later the Azania People’s Organization (AZAPO), and the Anti-apartheid Movement (in the UK, rebranded from ‘the Boycott Movement), formed, organized inside and around the continent, and were hosted and funded even through OAU mechanisms.76 Notwithstanding, the Arab League was a credible partner in the struggle against apartheid, driven by their regional interests, common historical experiences and a common

74 Arianna Lissoni, “Apartheid’s Little Israel: Bophuthatswana.” In Sean Jacobs and Jon Soske, Eds., Apartheid Israel: The Politics of an Analogy (Chicago: Haymarket Books, 2015), 54. 75 Lissoni, “Apartheid’s Little Israel”, 2015. 76 Amneh Badran, Zionist Israel and Apartheid South Africa: Civil society and peace

building in ethnic-national states (New York: Routledge, 2010).

4

AFRICA HURU! COMPLEX EVENTS—COLD WAR …

133

adversary that manifested in the relationship between Israel and South Africa. On the Persistence of White Minority Rule in Africa: Rhodesia Southern Rhodesia, today the sovereign Republic of Zimbabwe—in one of the 14 official names and 16 official languages that reflect the ethnic diversity, once the site of the Great Zimbabwe and most recently, a noncoup d’état ousting the country’s first post-independence leader, has a rather colorful history, revolving around its colonization, presidents for life and repossession of land, but more importantly, as a ‘settler colony’ where a white minority was determined to establish an ethnically homogeneous and blacks-excluding country, reflected in Ian Smith’s Unilateral Declaration of Independence from the British in 1965. Rhodesia was complex, in ways that will not be captured here, but in the context of OAU’s foreign policy toward Southern Rhodesia, collaborators with the apartheid government of South Africa, its declaration of independence and desire to no longer be controlled by Britain, while simultaneously marginalizing Africans, was rather unique—in that it occurred despite the new British position of ‘no independence before majority rule’ (NIBMAR).77 Cecil Rhodes’ British South Africa Company (BSAC) was first granted a royal charter in 1889 with the first pioneers arriving a year later, attracted by Rhodes’ promises of gold deposits. By 1903, the focus turned to agriculture as a more viable path to wealth, introducing crops including tobacco. The early trajectory of the colony followed those of other European colonies; i.e., “constructing socioeconomic distinctions that clearly identified whites as the ruling majority, and by forcing the large indigenous black population to become economically interdependent on them.”78 This included imposition of a hut tax in 1894, subordination of blacks as a prerequisite for progress, land restriction and increase in taxes as ‘a moral force,’ improvement and cure of ‘inherent deficiencies

77 S. R. Ashton and Wm William Roger Louis, East of Suez and the Commonwealth 1964–1971: Europe, Rhodesia, Commonwealth, University of London, Institute of Commonwealth Studies, British Documents on the End of Empire, Series A, Volume 5 (London: University of London Press, 2004). 78 Julie Bonello, “The Development of Early Settler Identity in Southern Rhodesia: 1890–1914.” The International Journal of African Historical Studies, vol. 43, no. 2 (2010), 347.

134

S. M. MAGU

in the native character’ through labor, and above all, social separation, guided by “Victorian beliefs about the supremacy of European civilization,”79 ideas and practices traced to “the settlers’ British South African roots, which were firmly entrenched in notions about racial segregation; those of British stock in Africa had a responsibility to continuously assert themselves over the perceived inferior ‘kafir’ race.”80 Additional to the economic independence that was growing, despite the connections and origins of the colony in South Africa, by 1922, rather than becoming the fifth province of South Africa, Rhodesia voted for independence, assuring limited internal self-rule while remaining under British dominion, with a goal to eventually have a relationship with Britain such as Australia’s and New Zealand’s.81 But this brooked even more protest from the African population—reflecting an intensification of clashes especially with the Mashona and Ndebele peoples, on realizing the changes in land ownership and losses in ‘negotiations’ with their representatives. These had initially been exchanged for guns and other modern curiosities, until the settlers simply claimed land under property rights on realizing the insufficiency of the mineral wealth as a source of riches for the prospectors and pioneers. After voting for internal self-rule, the minority White settlers proceeded to enact policies that were similar to those enacted in South Africa, e.g., the Land Apportionment Act, which now legally limited access by many Blacks to land, forcing them into (forced) labor to earn an upkeep and pay hut taxes. In fact, the 1922 vote to secure internal rule was widespread in other British colonies. For example, in response to the threatened revolt and declaration of independence in 1923 by white settlers in Kenya, “the British Colonial Secretary at the time admitted to Cabinet that Britain would be powerless to meet the threat and that neither African nor European troops could be employed against the rebels without some unfortunate consequences,”82 dealing a ‘fatal’ blow to “British prestige in

79 Bonello, “The Development of Early Settler Identity in Southern Rhodesia”, 348. 80 Bonello, “The Development of Early Settler Identity in Southern Rhodesia”, 348. 81 Josephine Lucy Fisher, Pioneers, Settlers, Aliens, Exiles: The Decolonisation of White

Identity in Zimbabwe (Canberra: ANU E Press, 2010). 82 Osita C. Eze, “OAU Faces Rhodesia.” African Review, vol. 5, no. 1 (January, 1975),

46.

4

AFRICA HURU! COMPLEX EVENTS—COLD WAR …

135

the whole of Africa”83 procure insecurity for Europeans anywhere on the continent, and face contention in Britain and elsewhere. Yet, even though the British Parliament reserved unto itself the powers to ensure that discriminatory laws—such as those in South Africa and Rhodesia—were not passed, in effect ‘protecting’ Africans, the British Parliament took no action in the case of South Africa and Rhodesia, likely emboldening the pro-white settlers-in-Africa movements. In 1953, as the heat of World War II dissipated, the British inaugurated the Central African Federation that featured Southern Rhodesia (Zimbabwe), Northern Rhodesia (Zambia) and Nyasaland (Malawi). The federation had been first proposed by Rhodes’ British South Africa Company in 1915, to minimize the cost of administering territories. The proposal found little support especially among South Rhodesia’s white settlers, “who were still hopeful of obtaining self-government and feared that the amalgamation would only complicate matters and delay realisation of their objective.”84 The Hilton Young Commission, working between 1927 and 1929 to examine a federation to include British colonies and mandates, i.e., “Tanganyika, Kenya, Uganda, Southern and Northern Rhodesia and Nyasaland, [but] did not find enough common interests between the two groups of countries to justify any formal union among them.”85 The Central African Federation was short-lived: Nyasaland (Malawi) and Northern Rhodesia (Zambia) gained independence, while Southern Rhodesia declared independence. This made sense—even for Southern Rhodesia—given the sweeping wave of liberation in East and Central Africa. The difference would be that in Southern Rhodesia, the government and the economy would continue to be dominated by white minority rule.86 Through 1965 and even later, in most United Nations documents and deliberations of the OAU, Southern Rhodesia was considered to be legally a British colony; “sovereignty and legal authority of the United

83 Eze, “OAU faces Rhodesia”, 46. 84 Alois S. Mlambo, A History of Zimbabwe (New York: Cambridge University Press,

2014), 119. 85 Mlambo, A History of Zimbabwe, 120. 86 BBC News, “Zimbabwe Profile—Timeline”, BBC News, March 19, 2018. https://

www.bbc.com/news/world-africa-14113618.

136

S. M. MAGU

Kingdom in Southern Rhodesia”87 was globally recognized, while Ian Smith’s UDI was not recognized by any country. Britain’s legal responsibility for Southern Rhodesia was reiterated by Nyerere, writing in 1966 that, compared with apartheid which subjected Africans to inferior status, restrictions of freedom, work and life, in Southern Rhodesia, “Britain was the power responsible for the future in Southern Rhodesia,”88 and therefore, responsibility to shepherd it, under the NIBMAR policy, to full independence. Nyerere drew parallels between the western powers’ choices during World War II (in not negotiating with Germany), the unwillingness of Jews outside of Germany to accept compromises that would leave some Jews living under Nazi Germany rule; Nyerere echoed Nkrumah’s view that Ghana’s independence was incomplete as long as parts of Africa were not free.89 He especially took issue with Portugal’s approach, which mirrored Rhodesia and South Africa’s: “Portugal pretends that her African colonies are really part of Europe […] she claims instead to be in the process of making European Gentlemen out of the African inhabitants, talks proudly of the policy equality for the assimilado”; that “Africans are not European, could not become European and do not want to become European. They demand instead the right to be Africans in Africa and to determine their own cultural, economic and political future.”90 The game of semantics, the use of human rights language and the appeal to man’s entitlement to freedom, liberation and self-determination were widely used by both sides to defend their actions, even the indefensible. Ian Smith was crafty, and his declaration of independence appealed to the language of self-determination similar to that found in the US Declaration of Independence. He proclaimed independence at the exact

87 US State Department. Office of the Historian. “Foreign Relations of the United States, 1964–1968, Volume XXIV, Africa”—No. 553, Paper Prepared in the Department of State, Washington, January 23, 1967. https://history.state.gov/historicaldocuments/ frus1964-68v24/d553. 88 Julius K. Nyerere, “Rhodesia in the Context of Southern Africa.” Foreign Affairs, vol. 44, no. 3 (April, 1966), 378. 89 Nyerere, “Rhodesia in the Context of Southern Africa”, 1966. 90 Nyerere, “Rhodesia in the Context of Southern Africa”, 375.

4

AFRICA HURU! COMPLEX EVENTS—COLD WAR …

137

moment of the Armistice Day (11 a.m., November 11), “to emphasize the white Rhodesians’ contributions to British wars,”91 holding that white settlers had “struck a blow for the preservation of justice, civilization and Christianity, and in the spirit of this belief, we have this day assumed our sovereign independence.”92 The declaration was framed in the context of geopolitics, aligning with western powers and their determination to contain communism: Southern Rhodesia would not countenance protests and opposition from “a small band of gullible nationalists used by communists.”93 But just as was the case in French Indochina, the ambivalence of western countries in confronting colonialism, and in some cases, perpetuating it, left freedom fighters little choice but to find, and accept help, from any quarter. For Rhodesia, even though the prospect of being forced to implement majority rule—by Zimbabweans, the British, the OAU or pressure from embargoes and shaming by international organizations—was fading, the UDI was almost a Pyrrhic victory: its former British ‘composition and outlook’ of a ‘loyal’ white colony that was part of the British Empire now gave way to a ‘rogue,’ ‘pariah’ state internationally shunned and sanctioned, abandoned by the very (British) country it hoped to become part of. The massive influx of settlers the UDI was expected to procure did not materialize, other than those of the 500 who listened to Kenyatta‘s speech, inviting them to stay after independence and help build Kenya,94 a substantial number came from South Africa, from Zambia and even Angola and Mozambique after both attained independence in 1975.95 Neither was it helpful that even at the risk of potential military action against host countries, counter-insurgency activities by the armed wings of ZANU and ZAPU substantially increased from the early 1970s.

91 Eliakim M. Sibanda, The Zimbabwe African People’s Union, 1961–87: A Political History of Insurgency in southern Rhodesia (Trenton: Africa World Press, Inc., 2005), 102. 92 Sibanda, The Zimbabwe African People’s Union, 102. 93 Sibanda, The Zimbabwe African People’s Union, 103. 94 Wunyabari O. Maloba, Kenyatta and Britain: An Account of Political Transforma-

tion, 1929–1963 (New York: Palgrave MacMillan, 2018); and Calder Walton, Empire of Secrets: British Intelligence, the Cold War, and the Twilight of Empire (New York: The Overlook Press/Peter Mayer Publishers, 2013). 95 Fisher, Pioneers, Settlers, Aliens, Exiles, 2010.

138

S. M. MAGU

Africa: Incensed, Motivated Against Rhodesia’s UDI Rhodesia’s Universal Declaration of Independence was followed by a flurry of activities at the local, regional and on the global stage. Actions at the state level were primarily based on geographical proximity and trade relations, and as we have previously seen, most of the southern African nations, out of a sense of self-preservation, location as the neighbors of colonies, economic interdependence and that some were encircled, left Zambia, Zaire, Tanzania and countries north as the most immediate threats, territorially, to South Rhodesia. But at the UN and at the OAU, there was concerted effort to keep unrelenting pressure on Southern Rhodesia and Smith’s government, providing training grounds and arm and by way of resolutions, eliciting support among African nations. The OAU, despite the inability to take a consensus position, was one of the most visible in this arena. Although the ultimate goal for the OAU and the different liberation organizations working in Rhodesia was the ultimate liberation of the country from colonialism and more recently, UDI‘s minority government rule, there were ideological differences between the major liberation organizations working in the country. The Zimbabwe African National Union (ZANU), the ‘less communist’ pro-western liberation party and its military wing, Zimbabwe African National Liberation Army (ZANLA), faced off against the minority government and the more Marxist-Leninist liberation organization, the Zimbabwe African Peoples’ Union (ZAPU) and its armed wing, the Zimbabwe People’s Revolutionary Army (ZIPRA), supported, funded and occasionally by the USSR; ZIPRA also had links to the Frente de Libertação de Moçambique (Eng: Mozambique Liberation Front), FRELIMO, and toward the latter part of the liberation war, often joined forces. This also challenged Africa’s non-alignment position as simultaneously the OAU was supporting freedom fighters receiving aid from one side of the NAM duality. By 1965, two years into its existence, the type of preferred, necessary institutions of the OAU was still subject to debate. Whether or not it was feasible, nay desirable for the OAU to have a military wing, was still under discussion. Nkrumah’s communication to “Congo Brazzaville, Sudan, Tanzania, Zambia and Guinea urged the formation of an African High Command to remove the illegal minority regime of southern Rhodesia.”

4

AFRICA HURU! COMPLEX EVENTS—COLD WAR …

139

Whether or not it was feasible, nay desirable for the OAU to have a military wing was still under discussion.96 Further, Nkrumah urged for the formation of a ‘Treaty of Mutual Defense and Security,’ called for the UN to take military action (authorize use of force), and threatened the British that OAU members would sever diplomatic relations with her, unless Britain intervened to back the sanctions with military force.97 Even for Nkrumah, this was reaching. Given the position of other African leaders who favored military actions less than they did diplomacy, it was unlikely that Nkrumah would prevail. For the OAU and ots members, particularly those proximate to Rhodesia, the complexity of the situation cannot be overemphasized. The nexus of Southern Rhodesia’s affinity to the apartheid regime in South Africa, and the alliance between South Africa and Israel, and Israel with the United States and western powers, often implied that the capabilities Southern Rhodesia could leverage, compared to those of the freedom fighters and their supporters, were almost indefatigable. Further, by 1967, South Africa “openly stated its military involvement in Rhodesia and its resolve to punish Tanzania and Zambia for harboring ZAPU and ANC insurgents, and so did Rhodesia.”98 Thus, even as countries such as Tanzania, Libya and Zambia allowed for the training, arming, residence and launching of attacks from their territory, there was the real possibility of armed conflict breaking out. South Africa pledged to “act against overseas, trained terrorists in every territory where it is allowed to […] South Africa police would remain in Rhodesia as long as they are allowed and as long as it was necessary.”99 Despite facilitating freedom fighters to operate from their territories, and even in the face of Nkrumah’s passionate call for a military high command capable of intervening in situations such as the Congo and now in Rhodesia, most African countries were keenly aware that they were militarily weak. Both Rhodesia and South Africa had far more military capabilities and alliances than Frontline States, South Africa and Rhodesia’s military hardware procurement capacity and partnerships were robust

96 Ama Biney, The Political and Social Thought of Kwame Nkrumah (New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2011), 154. 97 Biney, The Political and Social Thought of Kwame Nkrumah, 154. 98 Sibanda, The Zimbabwe African People’s Union, 130. 99 Sibanda, The Zimbabwe African People’s Union, 130.

140

S. M. MAGU

(considering that Portugal was a NATO member that continued occupying Angola and Mozambique. For Frontline States, there was a real risk of staring a war that they could never hope to win without the backing of such countries as Britain. Further, there was no indication that Britain would back such an endeavor, as distasteful as it found the UDI. As such, one of the strategies to confront the two regimes depended on insisting that Britain was the recognized colonial power over Rhodesia and had the responsibility of forcing it to accept majority rule, and “the O.A.U secretariat voiced some displeasure with the British government’s failure to crush the illegal smith regime.”100 It was thus good strategy to apply maximum pressure through all possible avenues. When Two Bulls Fight: Nkrumah’s Militancy and Nyerere’s Pragmatism Nkrumah’s passion and advocacy was probably matched by that which was happening elsewhere on the continent, with more staying power. His appeal to militancy and the Soviet Union led to his overthrow in 1966. It is unclear whether his proposed African High Command, had it been inaugurated, would have succeeded in pushing African countries into a conflict with apartheid South Africa. Despite their ardent pan-Africanism, challenges arising from the competing visions of Africa often got in the way of potential cooperation—especially, as seen previously, Nkrumah was in favor of continental integration, the context of which gives rationale to Nkrumah’s proposed military intervention. Yet Nkrumah remained suspicious of Nyerere, suggesting that Nyerere’s approach, including to the regional integration of East Africa before Africa, was ‘Balkanization, by any other name.’101 Yet on the issue of liberation from colonial power and control, both Nkrumah and Nyerere were unapologetically devoted to success. For both, African self-determination was most important and would not be substituted by the Portuguese version of turning Africans in Angola and Mozambique into “gentlemen” through assimilado, through the segregationist apartheid, or by Rhodesia’s UDI.

100 Sibanda, The Zimbabwe African People’s Union, 131. 101 Lawrence E. K. Lupalo, Nyerere and Nkrumah: Shared Vision (Scotts Valley:

CreateSpace, 2016).

4

AFRICA HURU! COMPLEX EVENTS—COLD WAR …

141

Besides Zambia, which was perilously surrounded by the Portuguese colony of Mozambique, a pliant Malawi and the decidedly hostile UDIRhodesia, Tanzania was one of the most important Frontline States. Tanzania also doubled up as the Headquarters of the OAU’s Liberation Committee, and hosted several movements, parties and often, their armed wings, including the ANC, PAC (South Africa), SWAPO (Namibia), MPLA, FRELIMO (Mozambique) and ZANU and ZAPU (Rhodesia).102 Nyerere’s proclivity toward African Socialism—Ujamaa— and his cautious approach to African integration through regional blocs rather than continentally, perpetually caused suspicion among some of the other member states, yet his importance is illustrated in Rhodesia’s Prime Minister referring to Nyerere as “the evil genius behind the liberation wars.”103 Nyerere’s importance was further highlighted as a mediator, as a solution-focused leader, by his meetings with the world-renown diplomat, Henry Kissinger: their meetings were longer, and more numerous, even as Kissinger acknowledged Nyerere’s deep suspicion of American institutions and interests, as exemplified by his termination of the US Peace Corps program volunteers’ placement in Tanzania in 1969—albeit in protest against the US Vietnam War.104 Between 1964 and 1980, the United Nations General Assembly (UNGA) and the United Nations Security Council (UNSC) passed a number of resolutions relating to Southern Rhodesia, two of the most consequential of these were UN General Assembly Resolution 1514 (XV) of 14 December 1960, “Declaration on the Granting of Independence to Colonial Countries and Peoples,”105 and the UN General Assembly Resolution 1654 (XVI) of 27 November 1961.106 At the UN Security 102 Seth M. Markle, A Motorcycle on Hell Run: Tanzania, Black Power, and the Uncertain Future of Pan-Africanism, 1964–1974 (East Lansing: Michigan State University Press, 2017). 103 Godfrey Mwakikagile, Tanzania Under Mwalimu Nyerere: Reflections on an African Statesman, 2nd ed. (Dar es Salaam: New Africa Press, 2006), 111. 104 Godfrey Mwakikagile, Africa in Transition: Witness to Change (Dar es Salaam: New Africa Press, 2018). 105 United Nations Organization, The United Nations and Decolonization—Main Documents: Declaration on the Granting of Independence to Colonial Countries and Peoples. UNGA Resolution 1514 (XV) of 14 December 1960. 106 United Nations General Assembly, “The situation with regard to the implementation of the Declaration on the granting of independence to colonial countries and peoples.” A/RES/1654 (XVI) of 27 November 1961.

142

S. M. MAGU

Council, a consequential resolution was the December 1966 Resolution No. 232. It attracted 11 votes for, none against, and 4 abstentions by Bulgaria, France, Mali and the Soviet Union, the resolution, while reaffirming the ‘inalienable rights of the people of Southern Rhodesia to freedom and independence’ pursuant to UNGA Resolution 1514 (XV) of 12/14/1960. Although it imposed voluntary sanctions over Southern Rhodesia, it also set the stage, a precedent for future UN Security Council and General Assembly resolutions that would incessantly target the country. Resolution 232, among others, prohibited the import of certain products from Southern Rhodesia and any related activities, transfer of funds to Southern Rhodesia, shipping on aircraft and other vessels registered in Southern Rhodesia. Importantly, it addressed the sale “to Southern Rhodesia of arms, ammunition of all types, military aircraft, military vehicles, and equipment and materials for the manufacture and maintenance of arms and ammunition in Southern Rhodesia”107 among other stipulations. Other numerous resolutions addressing Rhodesia’s situation were voted on in the preceding and subsequent years, reaffirming Rhodesia’s—and, rather disturbingly, other countries’—noncompliance with international obligations (as independent entities or as a part of the British Empire), and imposing degrees of shaming, embargoes and sanctions. The total number of resolutions was staggering, and included Resolution 202 (6 May 1965), which made references to Resolution 1514 (XV) (14 December 1960), Resolution 1747 (XVI) (28 June 1962), Resolution 1760 (XVII) (31 October 1962), Resolution 1883 (XVIII) (14 October 1963) and Resolution 1889 (XVIII) (6 November 1963) and the UN Security Council‘s Resolution 216 (12 November, 1965), condemning “the unilateral declaration of independence made by a racist minority in Southern Rhodesia,” Resolution 217 (20 November 1965), a substantive follow-up on Res. 216, urging Britain take all appropriate measures to quell the usurpation of power by the racist minority, Resolution 253 (29 May 1968), Resolution 277 (18 March 1970), and Resolution 388 (6 April 1976) among others, all of which, in addition to highlighting the racial segregation and the usurpation of power by a small racial minority, affirmed that Britain was considered the de facto controlling power over Southern Rhodesia. 107 United Nations Security Council, “Resolution 232 (1966) of 16 December, 1966” (Web). https://undocs.org/S/RES/232(1966).

4

AFRICA HURU! COMPLEX EVENTS—COLD WAR …

143

Persistence, shaming and general activism on the part of the OAU kept the issues of apartheid, and colonialism—alongside other challenges on the continent—at the forefront of both the UN and its bodies, and with other regional, continental and global actors. In one of the exceedingly rare instances where the UN Security Council, in a resolution, directly addressed a regional organization,108 the UN Security Council, in Resolution S/RES/217 (1965), called “upon the Organization of African Unity to do all in its power to assist in the implementation of the present resolution, in conformity with Chapter VIII of the Charter of the United Nations,”109 while in the text of Resolution S/RES/277(1970), the Security Council called upon IOs, “in consultation with the Organization of African Unity, to give aid and assistance to refugees from Southern Rhodesia and those who are suffering from oppression by the illegal régime of Southern Rhodesia”110 and also for UN “specialized agencies and other international organizations in the United Nations system to make an urgent effort to increase their assistance to Zambia as a matter of priority.”111 The consensus African approach to the situation in Rhodesia found sympathy on a global scale, including a vote at the UN General Assembly on Resolutions 2945, and 2946 (XXVII), affirming the British ‘NIBMAR’ policy, specifically that the UN “reaffirms the principle that there should be no independence before majority rule,”112 the participation of all parties, ‘genuine representatives of the people,’ and condemnation of violations, the inability (or refusal) to enforce mandatory sanctions, and the circumventing of the sanctions—particularly by South Africa,

108 Vera Gowlland-Debbas, Collective Responses to Illegal Acts in International Law: United Nations Action in the Question of Southern Rhodesia (Dordrecht: Martinhus Nijhoff Publishers, 1990). 109 United Nations Security Council, “Resolutions Adopted by the Security Council in 1965—S/RES/217 (1965). United Nations. https://www.un.org/securitycouncil/con tent/resolutions-adopted-security-council-1965, n.p. 110 United Nations Security Council, “Resolutions adopted by the Security Council

in 1970—S/RES/277 (1970). United Nations Security Council. https://undocs.org/S/ RES/277(1970), n.p. 111 UNSC, “Resolutions Adopted by the Security Council in 1970”, n.p. 112 Yassin El-Ayouty, “Legitimization of National Liberation: The United Nations and

Southern Africa.” In Yassin El-Ayouty and H.C. Brooks, Eds., Africa and international organization (The Hague: Martinus Nijhoff 1974), 215.

144

S. M. MAGU

and Portugal, and to some extent, the UK and the US.113 There were challenges of verification of whether countries were complying with the sanctions, often couched in the language of ‘national security,’ and in Rhodesia Nehwati notes that “the UDI erected a strong curtain around its trading transactions. It is a serious crime in Rhodesia, under the Official secrets Act, and under the Emergency regulations to diverge certain information relating to the running of the economy,”114 cut-outs to arms purchases (for example, South Africa regularly purchased weapons from Taiwan, which was not a member of the UN, and therefore, exceedingly difficult to sanction, and was an ally of the United States. Yet given the previous UN Security Council resolutions, there were significant violations to the sanctions, carried out complicity, and aided by some of the very guardians of the international order, and of those chafing under the yoke of apartheid, racism and colonialism.

Concluding Thoughts Perhaps it was inevitable, perhaps situations lent themselves to exceeding complexity; how Africa dealt with the proposition to liberate the remaining colonies, particularly from an institutional perspective, would face internal and external challenges. By the time, the OAU was formed on 25th May 1963, slightly less than one-half of all African nations were independent, while others such as Kenya were only a few months removed from independence. Kwame Nkrumah’s rallying cry, of the incompleteness of Ghana’s independence in 1957, so long as other parts of Africa were still chafing under the yoke of colonialism, was embraced in principle, but in its execution, some states led what might have been either sabotage, or a good-faith effort to negotiate a solution to the problem— after all, many countries had done so, in processes that eventually led to their independence. It is important to note, however, that the new arrangements in the international order often prized fighting communism over the use of force to support independence, and the fact that Africa was

113 El-Ayouty, “Legitimization of National Liberation”, 1974. 114 Francis Nehwati, “Economic Sanctions against Rhodesia.” In Olav Stokke and Carl

Widsrand, Eds., United Nations , The UN -OAU Conference on Southern Africa, Oslo, 9–14 April, 1973: Papers and Documents (Uppsala: Scandinavian Institute of African Studies, 1973), 152.

4

AFRICA HURU! COMPLEX EVENTS—COLD WAR …

145

not quite a major, strategic region made supporting its cause that much more unattractive. Perspectives, approaches strategies to confront colonialism in the southern region of Africa—Mozambique and Angola controlled by Portugal, Southern Rhodesia by the British and South Africa an ‘independent’ republic and disenfranchisement of Africans—differed. Some of the strategies had to do with geographical proximity, others with peaceful versus conflictual resolution. Some strategies played to the global geopolitics; others were influenced by individual leaders based on experiences. What is clear is that even as the OAU was formed, the challenges it would face, the problems it would have to solve were well entrenched—South Africa’s, from 1910, Southern Rhodesia’s since 1922, and colonization that began in the shadow of the Berlin Conference. The OAU had turned 1 by the time Ian Smith declared the Southern Rhodesia independent. It was wracked by internal division, by competition including through the formation of regional, ~ phone blocs, primarily based on language and sometimes by geography, and some heads of state appeared to have forgotten their own, recent colonial experience, or why they joined the OAU, whose Art. 2, No. 1 (b) set out one of OAU’s purposes as being “to eradicate all forms of colonialism from Africa.”115 Questions of geography (distance between member states), homogeneity of African societies, states’ interests, overall commitment to liberation, robust institutions, credible commitments and enforcement infuse conversations around OAU/EU. The OAU’s determination to see European colonial powers depart found a receptive platform in tens of UN General Assembly and Security Council’s resolutions. Like the OAU/AU, the UN had no enforcement mechanisms—other than the very same sanctions that were flouted by even the major powers, and therefore racial segregation thrived. The UN Security Council, which recommends the admission of applicants to become member states of the United Nations did not take up Rhodesia’s quest for recognition, in part because it absolutely flies in the face of the UN Charter, the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, and the right to be free, but also, admission of Rhodesia under minority rule would have given the country legitimacy and sovereignty, the hallmarks of any country. By denying Rhodesia this recognition, and almost always referring to Rhodesia as a 115 Organization of African Unity (OAU) “OAU Charter.” The African Union. https:// au.int/sites/default/files/treaties/7759-file-oau_charter_1963.pdf.

146

S. M. MAGU

British colony, the inability to find settlers to occupy the purported ‘settler colony’ of Kenya, Rhodesia indeed had almost the worst outcome. In the context of organizations, despite the significant conflicts occasioned by the partition of Palestine, a number of wars between Israel and the Arab states, and the pursuit of Arab unity, best illustrated by the abortive political union between Syria and Egypt, the Arab League was a stoic, even dependable partner. The complexity of the Arab League members supporting African independence is remarkable, given that half of the member countries are not in Africa. Its support may have been due to the similarity of conditions with those to be found in Palestine, or their prior experience with the Europeans as part of the League of Nations Mandate, there were expressions of solidarity with sub-Saharan Africa, and the pursuit of liberation, with countries such as Libya providing weapons, training and safe harbor for these freedom fighters. Member states of the Arab League even pledged not to sell oil to South Africa. Thus, the League demonstrated clout in affecting South Africa’s conduct toward Africans. Through its 27-year concurrent existence with apartheid and before Rhodesia finally became truly independent with black majority rule, there were major disagreements, accusations of being puppets for communism, or equally terribly, imperialists and real, credible fear that even supporting the insurgent campaigns for freedom in the colonies might lead to an allout war with Rhodesia, which undoubtedly had an army far more on war footing with the capacity to do so, than many of the African countries did. The personality conflict between Nyerere and Nkrumah—although the latter was ousted in 1966—did not help the cause for liberation. And the age-old question remained, one of what strategy was best to confront South Africa, Rhodesia and Portugal, in order to facilitate full independence; to fight or not. In the final analysis, a combination of resolutions by the UN the OAU and other stakeholders, sanctions and shaming, support (monetary, logistical, training, residency) for the freedom fighters was instrumental in dealing with southern Africa. It seemed, after all, that the stick-and-carrot approach had worked, and foreign policy in Africa was coming into its own.

4

AFRICA HURU! COMPLEX EVENTS—COLD WAR …

147

References Abowd, Thomas Philip. Colonial Jerusalem: The Spatial Construction of Identity and Difference in a City of Myth, 1948–2012. Syracuse: Syracuse University Press, 2014. Akinsanya, Adeoye A. “Afro-Arab Cooperation and North Africa.” In Regional Integration in Africa: Bridging the North – Sub-Saharan Divide. Edited by Hamdy A. Hassan. Pretoria: AISA, 2011. Anda, Michael O. International Relations in Contemporary Africa. Lanham: University Press of America, 2000. Ashton, S. R. and Wm William Roger Louis. East of Suez and the Commonwealth 1964–1971: Europe, Rhodesia, Commonwealth. London: University of London Press, 2004. Badran, Amneh. Zionist Israel and Apartheid South Africa: Civil Society and Peace Building in Ethnic-National States. New York: Routledge, 2010. Ballali, Daudi, Pierre Dhonte, G. Terrier and Stéphane Cossé. Economic Trends in Africa: The Economic Performance of Sub-Saharan African Countries, Working Paper WP/94/109. Washington, DC: IMF, 1994. Belmonte, Laura A. Selling the American Way: U.S. Propaganda and the Cold War. Philadelphia: UPenn Press, 2008. Biney, Ama. The Political and Social Thought of Kwame Nkrumah. New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2011. Bonello, Julie. “The Development of Early Settler Identity in Southern Rhodesia: 1890–1914.” The International Journal of African Historical Studies, Vol. 43, No. 2 (2010): 341–367. https://www.jstor.org/stable/25741433. Boquet, Yves. The Philippine Archipelago. Cham: Springer Nature, 2017. Borstelmann, Thomas. Apartheid’s Reluctant Uncle: The United States and Southern Africa in the Early Cold War. New York: Oxford University Press, 1993. Borstelmann, Thomas. The Cold War and the Color Line: American Race Relations in the Global Arena. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2001. Buchanan, Patrick J. Churchill, Hitler, and “The Unnecessary War”: How Britain Lost Its Empire and the West Lost the World. New York: Crown Publishers, 2008. ˇ Cervenka, Zdenek. “The Organization of African Unity and The Policy of “Détente” in Southern Africa.” Law and Politics in Africa, Asia and Latin America, Vol. 8, No. 3/4 (Quartal 1975): 365–382. https://www.jstor.org/ stable/43108475. Commonwealth Secretariat. “Lusaka Declaration on Racism and Racial Prejudice.” The Commonwealth Heads of Government Secretariat. 7 August 1979. Persistent Link: http://www.thecommonwealth.org/shared_asp_files/upload

148

S. M. MAGU

edfiles/%7B4D975A14–367E-4545-8F6A-D2E83044D9A3%7D_The%20L usaka.pdf. Davis, Geoffrey V. Voices of Justice and Reason: Apartheid and Beyond in South African Literature. Amsterdam: Rodopi B. V., 2003. Delmendo, Sharon. The Star-entangled Banner: One Hundred Years of America in the Philippines. Quezon: The University of the Philippines Press, 2005. El-Ayouty, Yassin. “Legitimization of National Liberation: The United Nations and Southern Africa.” In Africa and international organization. Edited by Yassin El-Ayouty and H. C. Brooks. The Hague: Martinus Nijhoff, 1974. Eze, Osita C. “OAU faces Rhodesia.” African Review, Vol. 5, No. 1 (January 1975): 43–62. https://hdl.handle.net/10520/AJA00020117_193. Fisher, Josephine Lucy. Pioneers, Settlers, Aliens, Exiles: The Decolonisation of White Identity in Zimbabwe. Canberra: ANU E Press, 2010. Francis, David J. The Politics of Economic Regionalism: Sierra Leone in ECOWAS: Sierra Leone in ECOWAS. New York: Routledge, 2008. Giliomee, Hermann. The Last Afrikaner Leaders: A Supreme Test of Power. Cape Town: Tafelberg & UVA Press, 2012. Gowlland-Debbas, Vera. Collective Responses to Illegal Acts in International Law: United Nations Action in the Question of Southern Rhodesia. Dordrecht: Martinhus Nijhoff, 1990. Grundy, Kenneth William. Confrontation and Accommodation in Southern Africa: The Limits of Independence. Berkeley: UC Press, 1973. Hall, Richard. “The Lusaka Manifesto.” African Affairs, Vol. 69, No. 25 (1970): 180–183. Hall, Richard. “The Lusaka Manifesto.” African Affairs, Vol. 69, No. 275 (1 April 1970): 178–179. https://www.jstor.org/stable/719881. Hamilton, Nigel. The Mantle of Command: FDR at War, 1941–1942. New York: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, 2014. Human Rights Watch. Côte D’Ivoire—The New Racism: the Political Manipulation of Ethnicity in Côte d’Ivoire. Vol. 13, No. 6 (A). Washington, DC: Human Rights Watch, 2001. Hummel, Philip. My Life Growing up White during Apartheid in South Africa. Bloomington: AuthorHouse, 2011. Ingham, Kenneth. Obote: A Political Biography. New York: Routledge, 1994. Jennings, A. C. “Land Apportionment in Southern Rhodesia.” African Affairs, Vol. XXXIV, No. CXXXVI (July 1935): 296–312. https://doi.org/10.1093/ oxfordjournals.afraf.a100934. Kasrils, Ronnie. “Birds of a Feather: Israel and Apartheid South Africa—Colonialism of a Special Type.” In Israel and South Africa: The Many Faces of Apartheid. Edited by Ilan Pappé. London: Zed Books, 2015. Kasuka, Bridgette, ed., Prominent African Leaders since Independence. Dar es Salaam: New Africa Press, 2013.

4

AFRICA HURU! COMPLEX EVENTS—COLD WAR …

149

Kay, David A. “The Politics of Decolonization: The New Nations and the United Nations Political Process.” International Organization, Vol. 21, No. 4 (Fall 1967): 786–811 https://doi.org/10.1017/S0020818300013370. Lissoni, Arianna. “Apartheid’s Little Israel: Bophuthatswana.” In Apartheid Israel: The Politics of an Analogy. Edited by Sean Jacobs and Jon Soske. Chicago: Haymarket Books, 2015. Lupalo, Lawrence E. K. Nyerere and Nkrumah: Shared Vision. Scotts Valley: CreateSpace, 2016. Magu, Stephen. Great Powers and US Foreign Policy Towards Africa. New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2019. Mai Magdaline Mbong and Jules-Clement Mba. “Bilateral Trade Collaboration or Not? The Case of Africa and Latin America between 1996 and 2015.” In Africa, Latin America, and the Caribbean: The Case for Bilateral and Multilateral Cooperation. Edited by Sabella Ogbobode Abidde. Lanham: Lexington Books, 2018. Makinda, Samuel M. and F. Wafula Okumu. The African Union: Challenges of Globalization, Security, and Governance. New York: Routledge, 2007. Maloba, Wunyabari O. Kenyatta and Britain: An Account of Political Transformation, 1929–1963. New York: Palgrave MacMillan, 2018. Markle, Seth M. A Motorcycle on Hell Run: Tanzania, Black Power, and the Uncertain Future of Pan-Africanism, 1964–1974. East Lansing: MSU Press, 2017. Mlambo, Alois S. A History of Zimbabwe. New York: Cambridge University Press, 2014. Mandela, Nelson. Long Walk to Freedom: The Autobiography of Nelson Mandela. New York: Little, Brown and Company, 1995. Mann, Gregory. From Empires to NGOs in the West African Sahel: The Road to Nongovernmentality. New York: Cambridge University Press, 2015. Mays, Terry M. and Mark W. Delancey. Historical Dictionary of International Organizations in Sub-Saharan Africa. 2nd Ed. Lanham: The Scarecrow Press, Inc., 2002. McLane, Charles B. Soviet Strategies in Southeast Asia: An Exploration of Eastern Policy under Lenin and Stalin. Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1966. Miller, Jamie. An African Volk: The Apartheid Regime and Its Search for Survival. New York: Oxford University Press, 2016. Mwakikagile, Godfrey. Africa after Independence: Realities of Nationhood with Photos. Johannesburg: Continental Press, 2009. Mwakikagile, Godfrey. Africa in Transition: Witness to Change. Dar es Salaam: New Africa Press, 2018. Mwakikagile, Godfrey. Tanzania under Mwalimu Nyerere: Reflections on an African Statesman. 2nd ed. Dar es Salaam: New Africa Press, 2006.

150

S. M. MAGU

Ndlovu-Gatsheni, Sabelo J. “Pan-Africanism and the International System.” In Handbook of Africa’s International Relations. Edited by Tim Murithi. New York: Routledge, 2014. Nehwati, Francis. “Economic Sanctions Against Rhodesia.” In United Nations, The UN-OAU Conference on Southern Africa, Oslo, 9–14 April, 1973: Papers and Documents. Edited by Olav Stokke and Carl Widsrand. Uppsala: Scandinavian Institute of African Studies, 1973. Ngaima Sr. Samuel K. Factors in the Liberian National Conflict: Views of the Liberian Expatriates. Bloomington: Xlibris, 2014. Nyerere, Julius K. “Rhodesia in the Context of Southern Africa.” Foreign Affairs, Vol. 44, No. 3 (April 1966): 373–386. https://www.jstor.org/stable/200 39174. OAU. “OAU Charter.” The African Union. https://au.int/sites/default/files/ treaties/7759-file-oau_charter_1963.pdf. Page, Melvin Eugene and Penny M. Sonnenburg, Eds. Colonialism: An International, Social, Cultural, and Political Encyclopedia, Volume 1. Santa Barbara: ABC-CLIO, 2003. Parry, Emyr Jones. “The United Nations—I The Charter and its Operation.” In Satow’s Diplomatic Practice. 7th ed. Edited by Ivor Roberts. Cambridge: Oxford University Press, 2017. Pfister, Roger. Apartheid South Africa and African States: From Pariah to Middle Power, 1961–1994. New York: Tauries Academic Studies, 2005. Rofe, J. Simon. “Prewar and Wartime Postwar Planning: Antecedents to the UN Moment in San Francisco, 1945.” In Wartime Origins and the Future United Nations. Edited by Dan Plesch and Thomas G. Weiss. New York: Routledge 2015. Ruteere, Mutuma. “Liberia.” In Encyclopedia of Human Rights, Vol 1Afghanistan-Democracy and Right to Participation. Edited by David P Forsythe. New York: Oxford University Press, 2009. Schaefer, Richard T., ed. Encyclopedia of Race, Ethnicity, and Society, Volume 1. Thousand Oaks: Sage Publications 2008. Shamuyarira, N. M. “The Lusaka Manifesto Strategy of OAU States and its Consequences for the Freedom Struggle in Southern Africa.” The African Review, Vol. 2, No. 2 (April 1977). Shamuyarira, N.M. “The Lusaka Manifesto on Southern Africa, Lusaka 14th– 16th April 1969”, African Review, Vol. 1, No. 1 (1971): 66–78. https:// hdl.handle.net/10520/AJA00020117_32. Sibanda, Eliakim M. The Zimbabwe African People’s Union, 1961–87: A Political History of Insurgency in southern Rhodesia. Trenton: Africa World Press, Inc., 2005. South African Democracy Education Trust. The Road to Democracy in South Africa: Volume 2 [1970–1980]. Pretoria: Unisa Press, 2006.

4

AFRICA HURU! COMPLEX EVENTS—COLD WAR …

151

Thompson, Roger M. Filipino English and Taglish: Language switching from multiple perspectives. Philadelphia: John Benjamins Publishing Company 2003. United Nations in South Africa. “The UN: Partner in the Struggle Against Apartheid,” United Nations (Web). n.p. https://www.un.org/en/events/ mandeladay/un_against_apartheid.shtml. United Nations, “UN Documentation: Decolonization—Key UN Documents Related to Decolonization.” United Nations Research Documentation—Dag Hammarskjold Library (Web). https://research.un.org/en/docs/decoloniz ation/keydocs. United Nations. “1941: The Declaration of St. James’ Palace. History of the United Nations.” https://www.un.org/en/sections/history-united-nationscharter/1941-declaration-st-james-palace/index.html. United Nations. “1942: Declaration of the United Nations”. United Nations. 18 March 2018. https://www.un.org/en/sections/history-united-nationscharter/1942-declaration-united-nations/index.html. United Nations. “217 (III). International Bill of Human Rights. A Universal Declaration of Human Rights: Preamble.” UN Docs. 10 December 1948. http://undocs.org/A/RES/217(III), 71. United Nations. “Main Organs: Trusteeship Council.” United Nations. Web. https://www.un.org/en/sections/about-un/main-organs/index.html. United Nations. “Declaration on The Granting of Independence to Colonial Countries and Peoples.” United Nations Audiovisual Library of International Law (Web). Docs. 10 December 1948. http://undocs.org/A/RES/217(III). United Nations Security Council. “Resolution 232 (1966) of 16 December, 1966” (Web). https://undocs.org/S/RES/232(1966). United Nations Security Council. “Resolutions Adopted by the Security Council in 1965—S/RES/217 (1965)”. https://www.un.org/securitycouncil/con tent/resolutions-adopted-security-council-1965. United Nations Security Council. “Resolutions adopted by the Security Council in 1970—S/RES/277 (1970)”. United Nations. https://undocs.org/S/ RES/277(1970). United Nations General Assembly. The United Nations and Decolonization— Main Documents: Declaration on the Granting of Independence to Colonial Countries and Peoples. A/RES/1514 (XV) of 14 December 1960. https:// www.un.org/en/decolonization/declaration.shtml. United Nations General Assembly. The Situation with Regard to the Implementation of the Declaration on the Granting of Independence to Colonial Countries and Peoples. A/RES/1654 (XVI) of 27 November 1961. https://www.un. org/en/ga/search/view_doc.asp?symbol=A/RES/1654(XVI). US Department of State. Office of the Historian. “Foreign Relations of the United States, 1964–1968, Volume XXIV, Africa”—No. 553. Paper Prepared

152

S. M. MAGU

in the Department of State, Washington, 23 January 1967. https://history. state.gov/historicaldocuments/frus1964-68v24/d553. US Department of State, Office of the Historian. “The Kellogg-Briand Pact, 1928.” Milestones: 1921–1936 (Web). Available from https://history.state. gov/milestones/1921-1936/kellogg. US Department of State. Office of the Historian. “Milestones 1937–1945 The Atlantic Conference & Charter, 1941.” (Web). Available from https://his tory.state.gov/milestones/1937-1945/atlantic-conf. van den Top, Gerhard. The Social Dynamics of Deforestation in the Philippines: Actions, Options and Motivations. Copenhagen: Nordic Institute of Asian Studies, 2003. Walton, Calder. Empire of Secrets: British Intelligence, the Cold War, and the Twilight of Empire. New York: The Overlook Press/Peter Mayer Publishers, 2013.

CHAPTER 5

Nation vs. Continent: Sovereignty, Territorial Integrity and Rebellion

Introduction This chapter addresses two polar opposite issues: closer regional collaboration through RECs and continental unity through the OAU, but tempered by the perennial human condition of armed conflict. Early on, intrastate conflicts appear in the shadow of Africa’s of Regional Trade Associations (RTAs) and Regional Economic Communities (RECs). These groups were built on and based upon relationships with former colonizers (e.g., Anglophone, Francophone or Lusophone) countries. They included linguistic communities such as the abortive, if ever active French Community, regional, financial and commercial relations-based organizations such as the Communauté Financière d’Afrique (CFA) or Air Afrique; there was also the larger set of linguistic-post-colonial global associations, e.g., the Commonwealth. That members were now fighting was surprising but not unexpected. Most of the warring countries shared colonial experiences, borders, and often, people. As Morocco and Algeria fought in the ‘Sands War’ in 1963 and 1964, OAU and the Arab League responses (to which both were members) demonstrated the challenges of conflict resolution. In the Horn of Africa, Ethiopia and Somalia were at it, later Somalia and Kenya and most unexpectedly, Tanzania and Uganda in the late 1970s, shortly after the collapse of EAC I, to which both were members. Yet through these conflicts, the OAU and RECs did cut their teeth in addressing conflict, often successfully. © The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2021 S. M. Magu, Explaining Foreign Policy in Post-Colonial Africa, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-62930-4_5

153

154

S. M. MAGU

Newly independent African states quickly found themselves revisiting the unfinished business of managing pre-colonial societal relations, their distaste for each other fed by the fires of colonial control. They were now especially magnified by the competition occasioned by multiparty democracy that procured winners and losers: winners—controlled government, losers—did not. Interstate borders often divided groups, sovereignty was a buzzword but some states’ strings were being pulled from London or Paris or Madrid, state integrity and cohesion were not assured, state fragility and failure quickly clarified that new states were just beginning the work. Almost without exception, two or more groups were central players in liberation movements, often played against each other by colonial fiddlers. Their sources of support, methods and even disagreements were reflected in the broader Cold War and geopolitical alignments, in funding and support. Global geopolitics, alliances and rivalries between the US and its allies, on the one hand, and the USSR and its allies were sometimes papered over as groups in opposition subsumed their differences to the higher purpose of independence. For the superpowers, African independence and new nations offered even more space for the proxy games that characterized the Cold War. Weeks after liberation from the Belgian colonial experience, Congo was wracked by conflict—control natural resources critical to superpower status, including Uranium that had been used in the US atomic bomb providing extra impetus, and with other countries getting in on the actions. Support for factions continued during the Cold War and coups d’état persisted. The conflicts in Africa, mainly over resources, were often supported by the superpowers, as proxy conflicts. These coups d’état, conflicts and more broadly, state contestation and (non) alignment are examined in this chapter—including the splits and secessions they produced in places such as Ethiopia/Somalia (Ogaden War), Angola, Rhodesia, Nigeria (Biafra, Bakassi peninsula) and the Congos. The issue of regionalism and secession is also addressed—from Nigeria, to the Congo (Katanga) to Ethiopia/Eritrea, some of the resulting state failures, and the African responses (or lack thereof). More broadly, this chapter examines the persistence of conflict (as of this writing, 40% of all global conflicts are estimated to be in Africa), the resulting instability and the OAU/AU’s actions to address (or not) these conflicts even as its mantra remains finding “African solutions to African problems.”

5

NATION VS. CONTINENT: SOVEREIGNTY …

155

Paradox of Regionalism: Challenging Continental Unity, Sovereignty and Non-Interference Are more and newer organizations, better? African countries retained and continued to create new regional organizations and economic communities even after OAU’s start. Africa faced a multitude of challenges on its path to continental unity; they included the sheer physical distances involved, infrastructure development and the structure of African organizations (centralism or federalism). On the surface, even ardent PanAfricanists such as Kwame Nkrumah recognized that differences, manifest in culture, language and colonial experiences of all Africa’s peoples, would make continental integration a challenge, even as this goal was relentlessly pursued.1 More important was the persistence of regional economic communities, blocs, trade associations and organizations, some dating back to the colonial period, which continued to thwart the broader goal of continental unity. Africa’s Regional Economic communities (RECs) and Regional Trading Associations (RTAs) showed greater promise of functioning as building blocks to a future United States of Africa than did the straight drive to continental federation. But even as regional blocs thrived, the incremental and gradual functionalist approach benefitted from continued enthusiasm, a history of organizing through Pan Africa Congresses, and ability to leverage technical assistance for secretariats, funding and other important issues.2 Mazzeo labels this (functionalist approach) the second school of thought that is based on economic integration, a slow and gradual process that contrasts with the federalist approach favored Kwame Nkrumah, but vehemently opposed by the ‘conservative, former French colonies’ that favored consolidation of national sovereignty first.3 The federalist approach proposed “launching a frontal attack on national sovereignty […] the adoption of a common constitution and the creation of joint institutions of a common government [complete with the coercive power of a central government] integrated economy and 1 Victoria R. Nalule, Energy Poverty and Access Challenges in Sub-Saharan Africa: The

role of regionalism (Cham: Palgrave Macmillan, 2019). 2 Korwa Gombe Adar, Monica Kathina Juma and Katabaro Miti, The State of Africa 2010/11: Parameters and Legacies of Governance and Issue Areas (Pretoria: Africa Institute of South Africa, 2010). 3 Domenico Mazzeo, “Introduction: the regional trend.” In Domenico Mazzeo, Ed., African Regional Organizations (New York: Cambridge University Press, 2014).

156

S. M. MAGU

community attitudes.”4 However, nations aspiring to regional integration as the pathway to unification were amenable to compromise. Adar, Juma and Miti concur, noting that nation states “typically have to cede aspects of their sovereignty to regional structures”5 even as the principles of sovereignty and non-interference in the affairs of other states remained sacrosanct in continental and global principles of statehood. Subconsciously, countries were more willing to cede aspects of their sovereignty to regional, but not to a continental federation. The dual challenge of resilient, residual regional organizations and affiliations to colonial relationships and networks are well chronicled. ˇ Cervenka argues that “too much attention has been devoted to the preservation of old links developed in the period of colonial rule”6 versus the local and regional networks that could ensue, undermining chances of reliable commitments. “The strong bilateral links with former colonial powers continued to mitigate against horizontal intra-African relations, while strengthening relations with Europe,”7 perhaps both as a function of dependency and leaders’ connections to Europe. Support engineered by the selfsame former colonial powers was insufficient to contain internal strife, ideological and political conflicts and the resulting hostilities between states and neighbors. Alluding to this, Guinea’s Sékou Touré‘s spat with Ivory Coast’s Houphouet-Boigny is well chronicled. Today, Africa has Regional Economic Communities (RECs) partnering with the AU and other IGOs. Tellingly, these RECs are at different stages of regional economic, political integration and cooperation. Some have shown promise, negotiating agreements bilaterally and multilaterally, while others have little results to show. The eight RECs include the Arab Maghreb Union (UMA), the Common Market for Eastern and Southern Africa (COMESA), the Community of SahelSaharan States (CEN-SAD), the East African Community (EAC), the Economic Community of Central African States (ECCAS), the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS) and its military wing, 4 Mazzeo, Introduction, 4. 5 Adar, Juma and Miti, The State of Africa 2010/11, 90. 6 Zdenek Cervenka, ˇ “The Need for a Continental Approach to the Problems of African

ˇ Land-Locked States.” In Zdenek Cervenka, Ed., Land-locked Countries of Africa (Uppsala: Nordiska afrikainstitutet, 1973), 319. 7 S.K.B. Asante, Regionalism and Africa’s Development: Expectations, Reality and Challenges (Hampshire: Macmillan Press Ltd, 1997), 34.

5

NATION VS. CONTINENT: SOVEREIGNTY …

157

ECOMOG, the Intergovernmental Authority on Development (IGAD) and the Southern African Development Community (SADC).8 The AU considers the eight RECs/RTAs ‘pillars’ of continental economic and political integration. This recognizes the importance of regionalism and the critical role RECs play, and is also a nod to a fusion of federalist and functionalist approaches. Interestingly, the RECs/RTAs have similar structures to other IGOs both in African and abroad. If RECs were the only actors competing for the meager financial and organizational resources, Africa’s balkanization, but also prospects of integration, might be vastly different. Smaller RECs must often inaugurate secretariats and other capital-intensive programs and projects to run the organization, dividing resources, capacities and prolonging integration. Practically, RECs are defensible, but one wonders if increasing regionalism takes away from RECs’ effectiveness and diverts attention and resources away from a more rapid process. Still, it is clear that the resources available to states and RECs diminish with increased numbers. Fredland illustrates this in West Africa, noting that as ECOWAS came to life in 1975 as a REC and an AU integration pillar, there were about 15 West African regional economic groups between 1958 and 1975, including the Mali Federation, Ghana-Guinea Union, Conseil de l/Entente, UDE, UAM, OAMCE, UMOA, UAMCE, OCAM, UDEAC, UDEAO, UEAC, OERS, OMVS and CEAO.9 The rest of Africa reflected some of these limited, issue-based organizations, including the African Financial Community (CFA), West African Economic and Monetary Union (WAEMU) and the Southern African Customs Union (SACU).10 Indeed, Byiers notes that countries are in many organizations: the DRC is a member of 14 organizations, Burundi 13, Rwanda 11.11 The overall effectiveness of (membership in) these organizations is suspect, given the 8 United Nations, “The Regional Economic Communities (RECs) of the African Union.” United Nations—Office of the Special Adviser on Africa (Web). November 1, 2019. https://www.un.org/en/africa/osaa/peace/recs.shtml. 9 Mazzeo, “Introduction”, 4; and R. A. Fredland, “OCAM: One Scezne in the Drama of West African Development.” In Domenico Mazzeo, Ed., African Regional Organizations (New York: Cambridge University Press, 2014). For the full names (French version) of the organizations, see pp. 105. 10 UNECA, History of Africa’s Regional Integration Efforts (Web, n.d., n.p). 11 B. Byiers, “Regional Organisations in Africa—Mapping Multiple Memberships”,

ECDPM Talking Points blog, September 15, 2017. https://ecdpm.org/talking-points/ regional-organisations-africa-mapping-multiple-memberships/.

158

S. M. MAGU

levels of conflict in the countries shown above with multiple memberships. Additionally, it is worth mentioning that many African countries continue to hold membership in organizations founded by their former colonizers, for example, the Commonwealth. RECs and RTAs: A Viable Pathway to Continental Unity? Since issues often spill over and affect countries in a region, regional players benefit cooperating on addressing issues. This is captured by Lyon, asserting that the “regional environment has assisted in managing a conflict, demonstrating responsible sovereignty on a broader scale. Neighbors can help create a balance of power among parties that encourages negotiations and can mediate or offer guarantees for peace agreements.”12 Salim concurs, noting that “regional organizations are the first line of defense in the search for solutions to conflict”13 due to their proximity to the issues (ethnicity, culture, geography, religion and history) shared across countries. RECs have often been brought together by expediency, but also as honest brokers, problem-solvers and community managers carrying monitoring, implementation and verification. They have also been a vehicle to mobilize global resources such as foreign assistance, easily reach consensus and work more effectively than as part of a bloc of Africa’s 54 countries.14 IOs and RECs often grow and exceed their foundational goals. IGAD, the Horn of Africa-based regional, Intergovernmental Authority on Development, is a good example: IGAD was formed in 1996 by Djibouti, Ethiopia, Kenya, Somalia, Sudan and Uganda, a successor to the InterGovernmental Authority on Drought and Development (IGADD), itself formed in 1986 to “coordinate the efforts of member countries, primarily

12 Terrence Lyons, “Can Neighbors Help? Regional Actors and African Conflict Management.” In Francis M. Deng, Terrence Lyons, Eds., African Reckoning: A Quest for Good Governance (Washington, DC: Brookings, 1998), 68. 13 Salim Ahmed Salim, “The OAU Role in Conflict Management.” In Olara A. Otunnu and Michael W. Doyle, Eds., Peacemaking and Peacekeeping for the New Century (Lanham: Rowman & Littlefield Publishers, Inc., 1998), 246. 14 Dimpho Motsamai and Mzukisi Qobo, “Regionalism in Africa: Development Crises and the Growing Influence of Emerging Powers.” In Lorenzo Fioramonti, Ed., Regions and Crises: New Challenges for Contemporary Regionalisms (Cham: Palgrave Macmillan, 2012).

5

NATION VS. CONTINENT: SOVEREIGNTY …

159

to deal with drought and other related disasters in the region.”15 Over time, IGAD evolved goals exceeding simply managing drought: today, they include food security, the environment, peace, security and humanitarian issues and economic cooperation and integration. The latter is also part of the EAC II, with the addition of Sudan, Somalia and Djibouti. In this instance, challenges peculiar to the Horn of Africa led to the formation of an organization that has might function more efficiently than a continental body. Ultimately, RECs can produce positive outcomes just as easily as negative ones. Evidence of their existence as antithetical to and detrimental to the integrational aspirations of the African continent regularly demonstrates net positive outcomes, DRC, Burundi and Rwanda’s outcomes ˇ notwithstanding. Cervenka argues that “the regional groupings of African states, once regarded as incompatible with the OAU Charter, have become, with the sole exception of OCAM, a means of strengthening the Organisation of African Unity.”16 This argument stands to scrutiny with regard to the effective distribution of resources: How much do regional organizations take away from continental unity? Is membership to one (regional or continental) rather than both (regional and continental body) more efficient? The benefits and accomplishments RECs procure on specific issues and regions validate their existence in spite of the hypothesized and observed outcomes17 ; in addition, it is clear that the rational actor that is the African state would not invest in them if they were not beneficial, or if they were simply duplicating existing functions of other RECs.18 There is a plausible counter-argument to be made regarding the efficacy of sub-regional, issue and geography-based RECs. Regional integration through the various mechanisms, while showing some promise,

15 Richard E. Mshomba, Economic Integration in Africa: The East African Community in Comparative Perspective (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2017), 24; and the African Union, n.d., n.p.). 16 Cervenka, ˇ “The Need for a Continental Approach to the Problems of African LandLocked States”, 319. 17 Amer Salih Araim and Nibras M. Araim, Intergovernmental Commodity Organizations and the New International Economic Order (New York: Praeger, 1991). 18 UNECA and African Union, Assessing Regional Integration in Africa II: Rationalizing Regional Economic Communities (Addis Ababa: Economic Commission for Africa, 2006).

160

S. M. MAGU

also exposed the limits of the same, and the challenges that regionalism would occasion to any desired cooperation. In essence, they were demonstrating what scholars have often labeled the dilemmas of common interests and dilemmas of common aversions: two or more different entities know, and acknowledge, that they want the same things, but cannot quite agree on how to get there—for example, decolonization (negotiate, or take the hardline non-negotiable approach that included armed military actions). Dilemmas of common aversions refer to things that two or more parties agree they want to avoid (e.g., continued colonial control by European powers, or apartheid), but disagree on how to achieve the desired outcome. Although RECs have now shown themselves to be a likely more viable path to continental integration, it was not evident in the early independence years, that this was the path there. The amounts of resources allocated by countries to several RECs were meager; splitting them across many RECs seemed to inevitably lead to ineffectiveness. But perhaps the outcomes of RECs ought not to be the only measure: RECs were learning, they were organizing, and they were benefitting from the process of emplacing structures and were beginning to undertake collective bargaining at IGO forums, e.g., UN and UNCTAD. Monitoring others’ behaviors, whether they cooperated or did not, their propensity to follow rules—these would be important lessons in the future—and even as some, such as EAC I, collapsed under the weight of regional dissonance, the structures and in some cases, the infrastructure built, was going to be of great import. Further, they continued to interface with OAU and its programs, e.g., the ALC committee that was able to trump the regional parochial interests to attain collective continental outcomes.19 Commonwealth of Former Colonies and the British Empire’s Reincarnation Nothing illustrates African nations’ conundrum, exercise of independence and charting a new pathway better than the British-fangled Commonwealth of Nations (or the Commonwealth). The irony of former colonies—most recently minions of the British Empire upon whom, alas, 19 Immanuel Wallerstein, “The Role of the Organization of African Unity in Contemporary African Politics.” In Yassin El-Ayouty and Hugh C. Brooks, Eds., Africa and International Organization (The Hague: Martinus Nijhoff, 1974).

5

NATION VS. CONTINENT: SOVEREIGNTY …

161

the sun was fast setting—now joining an organization run by the selfsame former colonial power that had denied them recognition or independence, than the Commonwealth. It dates back to the 1920s (Imperial Conference—though some suggest—1830s), formalized by the Statute of Westminster) and the London Declaration of 1949 by 7 nations and its secretariat established in 1965. The latter, ironically, spoke of unity “as free and equal members of the Commonwealth of Nations, freely cooperating in the pursuit of peace, liberty and progress.”20 The UK still had many colonies then,21 but former colonies, independent were joining Commonwealth. Membership was open to primarily former British colonies, but other nations—Rwanda—joined in 2009.22 Its 53 members are home to earth’s 33 percent (or 2.4 billion) persons.23 Besides its annual (CHOGM) meeting, the Commonwealth Games, first held in 1930, are held every four years.24 The conundrum of independent African nations is debated, particularly apprehending the conditions they were departing. African leaders “tended to favor continuing participation in the British Commonwealth, whereas those who were closely affiliated with the movement’s Youth League and/or held local and regional leadership positions tended to regard such participation as evidence of neocolonial rule.”25 There were concerns Commonwealth membership ran afoul of non-alignment. “We have already declared that we are going to be non-aligned and if we go around Britain in the form of a satellite, would we not be swinging in another satellite altogether?”26 For former post-World War I Britishadministered Mandate Territories (e.g., Tanzania), membership was not

20 The Commonwealth, “The London Declaration” (Web), https://thecommonwealth. org/london-declaration. April 7, 2013. 21 Commonwealth Secretariat, “The London Declaration”, n.p., n.d. 22 Timothy Longman, Memory and Justice in Post-Genocide Rwanda (New York:

Cambridge University Press, 2017). 23 The Commonwealth, “About us”, 2010. 24 W. David McIntyre, The Significance of the Commonwealth, 1965–9 (New York:

Macmillan, 1991). 25 Ronald Aminzade, Race, Nation, and Citizenship in Postcolonial Africa: The Case of Tanzania (New York: Cambridge University Press, 2013), 76. 26 The National Assembly, Republic of Kenya, Kenya National Assembly Official Record (Hansard) June 1–July 30, 1965, Second Session (cont’d) (Nairobi: Government Printer, 1965), 22.

162

S. M. MAGU

intuitive: while Nyerere supported Commonwealth membership, MPs thought it a hindrance to African unity. “Stronger than ties and treaties,” argued Nyerere, “less selfish than alliances, less restrictive than any other associations, the Commonwealth seems to my colleagues and to me to offer much hope in the world today for lasting peace and friendship among peoples of the world.”27 Although Nyerere’s position reflected his dualist approach—regional integration followed by continental unity—his Commonwealth ambitions were tempered by perception that Tanzania was exercising a ‘reign of terror’ over the secessionist-minded Zanzibar.28 The Commonwealth’s challenges were shared by other IGOs such as the OAU and UN, albeit with expectations to do more. Ian Smith’s 1965 Universal Declaration of Independence in Rhodesia saw African countries adopt the position that Britain should crush the minority-rule UDIrebellion.29 Several members threatened to boycott the UK itself if no action was taken—some, a small minority, made good on their threat.30 But Rhodesia was complicated, and it wasn’t clear that Britain could force a course change. Despite their opposition to Rhodesia’s UDI and South Africa’s apartheid, British inaction on both, expectation of Britain to do more and their support for liberation, all positions at odds, African countries were alarmed when Britain applied to join the EEC. “African states rejected the EEC on political grounds and warned Britain not to disregard Commonwealth interests,”31 despite the fact that Britain wanted—and had tried for over 15 years—to join the ECSC/EEC, going as far as cobbling together the EFTA. Just as Britain feared losing its ‘special relationship’ with the US, African Commonwealth members vigorously courted Britain away from relations that might imperil a relationship similarly conceived.

27 Aminzade, Race Nation, and Citizenship in Postcolonial Africa, 76. 28 U.S. Congress, Congressional Record: Proceedings and Debates of the 91st Congress,

First Session, Vol. 115-Part 2, January 22, 1969 to February 4, 1969 (pp. 1381–2774) (Washington, DC: United States Congress, 1969), 2223. 29 Konstantinos D. Magliveras and Gino J. Naldi, The African Union (Leiden: Kluwer Law International BV, 2018). 30 Omar A. Touray, The Gambia and the World: A History of the Foreign Policy of Africa’s Smallest State, 1965–1995 (Hamburg: Institut fur Afrika-Kunde, 2000). 31 Yusuf Bangura, Britain and Commonwealth Africa: The Politics of Economic Relations, 1951–75 (Dover: Manchester University Press, 1983), 35.

5

NATION VS. CONTINENT: SOVEREIGNTY …

163

Commonwealth membership showed that IGOs, considered by regime theory to be norm entrepreneurs, also validated cooperation to achieve common goals. Issues that beset the group included encouraging democratic governance in independent states (otherwise, South Africa and Rhodesia), promoting human rights (against Ken Saro-Wiwa’s 1995 execution) and the group’s threat to expel Nigeria absent major democratic and human rights reforms,32 giving visibility to critical issues and holding states accountability (Uganda’s Amin skipped the meetings especially after the 1972 debacle). Beneficial and useful as the Commonwealth was, it impacted the OAU: former British colonies showed less enthusiasm for it than Francophone countries.33 Members also showed; keeping Britain out of the EEC if it diluted the relationship, retain its ‘special relationship,’ temper vociferous objections to the nefarious state of affairs in the south (apartheid, UDI—even as Malawi was labeled as a ‘collaborator’), but absolutely retain the Anglo-alliance.34 The stage was set to insure that the OAU had headwinds heading its way—in the region and from Europe. Francophone Africa and Continental Unity Almost uniformly, former French colonies in Africa exhibited two traits that set them apart from the colonial experiences in the British, Portuguese, Spanish, Belgian and Italian colonies. Granted, Portugal’s colonization goals included a rather dubious, perhaps ambitious idea of turning colonial subjects in Africa into ‘gentlemen’ through education and ‘civilization,’ so perhaps it shouldn’t count. When accused of coercive colonial practices, the Portuguese air-shrugged and defended their actions, providing “works on ‘civilisation and colonisation’ that characterized the Portuguese colonial endeavor, against ‘historical falsehoods.’”35 The French approach to, treatment of and administrative practices of 32 Obed Yao Asamoah, The Political History of Ghana (1950–2013): The Experience of a Non-Conformist (Bloomington: AuthorHouse, 2014). 33 A. E. Thorndike, “Regionalism and the Commonwealth.” In A.J.R. Groom and Paul Taylor, Eds., Commonwealth in the 1980’s: Challenges and Opportunities (London: The Macmillan Press Ltd., 1989). 34 Thorndike, “Regionalism and the Commonwealth”, 1989. 35 Miguel Bandeira Jerónimo, The ‘Civilising Mission’ of Portuguese Colonialism, 1870–

1930 (New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2015); and Peter N. Stearns, Michael Adams and

164

S. M. MAGU

colonies and after independence was uniform except in Algeria. The French sought to keep Algeria at any cost, deeming it a French department. For some time and across its colonies, the French practiced the policy of ‘assimilation’; its overall effectiveness was suspect. And despite gaining territory after World War I, it did not increase numbers of colonial officials. French assimilation followed three trajectories; cultural assimilation imposed French culture on colonial subjects and personal legal assimilation afforded subjects a path to French citizenship rights, but limited their participation in political activities, e.g., voting or running office. The third approach, administrative assimilation, legally incorporated a/the colony into, and made it part of France if most residents achieved a high degree of success in the other two areas, i.e., the level of ‘Frenchness’ had occurred. Practically, Africans in French Algeria rarely gained citizenship rights, while French settlers in Algeria had full citizenship rights by default.36 The more popular and practical relationship between France and its African colonies was articulated through the policy of association, widely applied after World War II. Central to its philosophy, association’s attributes were “simplicity, flexibility, and practicality,” embracing “the need for variation in colonial practice.”37 The ‘assimilation’ policy appeared to mask class and racial distinctions in French colonies at a time when the eugenics pseudoscience was pervasive in Europe and the Americas. Both sides’ approach to assimilation was ambivalent; “the idea was that French civilization was the ideal civilization, and therefore French people had the divine duty of instilling French values in the Africans, thus considered uncivilized”38 trumped any pretense that colonies’ culture would be incorporated. Frindéthié makes this point, arguing, “Blacks resisted assimilation because of its

Stuart B. Schwartz, World Civilizations: The Global Experience, Volume 2 (New York: HarperCollins, 1996). 36 Jonathan Derrick, “Looking Back to ‘France of 100 Million Inhabitants’: Roots of

the Present in Colonial French Africa.” In Claire Griffiths, Ed., Contesting Historical Divides in Francophone Africa (NY: University of Chester Press 2013), 25. 37 Raymond Betts, Assimilation and Association in French Colonial Theory, 1890–1914 (Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press 2005), 106. 38 Martial Frindéthié, Francophone African Cinema: History, Culture, Politics and Theory (Jefferson: McFarland & Co. 2009), 124.

5

NATION VS. CONTINENT: SOVEREIGNTY …

165

veiled notion of French superiority.”39 It was confounding then, that on the eve of independence, Africa’s French colonies chose to continue their relations with France rather other African countries; the exception was Guinea. This became part of the OAU’s difficulties due to split loyalties. It may simply have been the elites though; Egudu implies that “the educated Francophone African thus ‘embraced French culture and his loyalty to it far exceeded any parallel felt by his counterpart in British territories.’”40 Association allowed colonies a choice: retain relations with France after independence or become fully independent, although de Gaulle’s actions implied potential French intervention.41 Assimilation was challenging particularly during the German occupation of France during World War II, the question of the proper French government—the collaborating Vichy French administration or La Résistance (the French resistance) and the Gouvernement provisoire de la République française (GPRF) (Provisional Government of the French Republic) under de Gaulle persisted.42 Orosz explains the switch to assimilation as informed by realization that, while an empire of 100 million Frenchmen/women was desirable, it was exceedingly difficult, if not impossible, to assimilate the expansive colonial empire with the existing colonial administrators (‘administrateurs des colonies’ ) deployed to the colonies.43 Colonial officials had the most administrative direct contact with French colonial subjects; they “functioned as construction engineer, judge, sanitation inspector, policeman, agronomist “who” oversaw the collection of taxes for his district, settled disputes and ‘guided the chiefs in their duties.’”44 There was just no enough of them to deploy. Another outcome of colonialism cultural and linguistic dissonance: almost universally, colonies adopted the colonial power’s language, 39 Frindéthié, Francophone African Cinema, 2009, 124. 40 Romanus N. Egudu, Modern African Poetry and the African Predicament (London:

Macmillan Press, 1978), 31. 41 Marjorie Lister, The European Union and the South: Relations with Developing Countries (New York: Routledge, 1997). 42 Ruth Ginio, French Colonialism Unmasked: The Vichy Years in French West Africa (Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 2006). 43 Kenneth J. Orosz, Religious Conflict and the Evolution of Language Policy in German and French Cameroon, 1885–1939 (New York: Peter Lang, 2008). 44 Victor T. Le Vine, Politics in Francophone Africa (Boulder: Lynne Rienner Publishers, 2004), 44.

166

S. M. MAGU

previewing the greater Francophone-Anglophone divisions that would replicate in the OAU. “Linguistic relations are an important feature of the OAU, where one also has Arabs and Lusophones”45 ; it was necessary for UNECA to be headquartered in Ethiopia, a neutral location in the Anglophone-Francophone beef. Even this concession was conditional: “as long as the ECA had an anglophone executive secretary, the OAU would have a francophone secretary-general.”46 Lusophone nations found liberation much later, while Arab nations’ early independence, membership of the Arab League and RECs premised on sociocultural, linguistic and religious homogeneity exacerbated this. Division also permeated OAU-EU-Africa-Caribbean and Pacific (ACP) convention talks. Leading Pan-Africanist leaders such as ‘Black Frenchman’ Senghor “seemed more at home in the political and intellectual circles of Paris than in the provincial milieu of his own capital, Dakar”47 while Félix Houphouët-Boigny “never attended a single summit of the OAU [despite] flying, usually twice a year, to Paris, and once even more widely in Europe in a futile attempt to bring back his beautiful young wife, who had left him.”48 These were peppered with accusations of the extent to which African leaders cooperated with neo-imperialism.49 OAU’s acceptance of colonial borders procured alternate dissatisfaction and conflicts stemming from ethnic groups spread across different countries (e.g., Maasai, two) or Somalis (four). Nationalism, based on shared ethnical, historical, linguistic and overall cultural similarities, had existed in pre-colonial Africa; now states were asked to replicate it across its population. A different conflict soon appeared: the intra- and interstate conflicts. They were waged for a variety of reasons; the levels and persistence of state (external) support differed and often pulled in neighbors, based on an array of internal and external factors. Some of the major conflicts that pitted two or more countries, such as the Ogaden War (or 45 Kaye Whiteman, “Mutual Perceptions in Africa.” In Anthony Kirk-Greene and Daniel Bach, Eds., State and Society in Francophone Africa Since Independence, (New York: St. martin’s Press, 1995), 279. 46 Whiteman, “Mutual Perceptions in Africa”, 279. 47 Colin Legum, Africa Since Independence (Bloomington: Indiana University Press,

1999), 29. 48 Legum, Africa Since Independence, 28–29. 49 Amadu Sesay, Olusola Ojo and Orobola Fasehun, The OAU After Twenty Years (New

York: Routledge, 2019).

5

NATION VS. CONTINENT: SOVEREIGNTY …

167

Ethio-Somali War), the Uganda–Tanzania War (or the Kagera War) and the Algeria-Morocco conflict (Sands War), are examples that are discussed next. Algeria/Morocco at War: OAU Responses to the ‘Sands War’ Four months after the OAU was founded, the Sand (or Sands) War erupted between Algeria and Morocco, two North African states; it was fought across a large swathe of their shared border and lasted between September 25, 1963, and February 20, 1964. Since the OAU had affirmed the uti possidetis only that May, it was the first test of the principle and OAU’s ability to resolve conflicts. In addition to membership in the OAU, both were members of the Arab League. There has long been a perception of daylight between North African (Arab) states and subSaharan Africa50 even though the former, attaining independence first and joining the Arab League, were ardent advocates of decolonization. If such daylight existed, the OAU could bridge the gap or simply let it simmer. North Africa had historically different experiences from the rest of Africa; more closely linked to western Asia and Europe. The differences manifest across history and race are powered by eugenics’-promoted inferiority, by geography, but especially by religion, which informs culture. It shared colonial experiences with the rest of Africa, making them natural allies. “Africa-Arab political solidarity and alliances have survived not because of the absence of Arab racism towards black Africans, but in spite of its painful existence.”51 Still, Africans’ acceptance by Arabs is the exception: “a student from Burkina Faso spoke of loneliness and repeated efforts to mingle with Moroccan students, to no avail.”52 Racism is evident: “the ever-presence of racism from the African Arab states to subSaharan Africans as a major obstacle and refers to religion as a barrier in

50 Steve Slocum, Why Do They Hate Us? Making Peace with the Muslim World (Vista: Top Reads LLC, 2019). 51 Shehu Sani, Hatred for Black People (Bloomington: Xlibris, 2013), 181. 52 Hamid Bahri, “Race and Color in North Africa and the Arab Spring.” In Moha

Ennaji, Ed., Multiculturalism and Democracy in North Africa: Aftermath of the Arab Spring (New York: Routledge, 2014), 145.

168

S. M. MAGU

the face of sub-Saharan Christian students living in a Muslim country.”53 The shared interests between the OAU and Arab League saw the latter’s involvement in seeking a resolution to the Sands War.54 The chilly relations led to a 1977 Afro-Arab Summit and “a resolution calling for the establishment of organic cooperation between the OAU and the Arab League.”55 The crisis’ genesis was Algeria laying claim to parts under Morocco’s jurisdiction. Morocco claimed that before and during colonialism, it controlled the disputed territory. As the disagreement persisted, Morocco provided aid to rebels fighting Algeria, defying OAU’s uti possidetis position and violating member state sovereignty. The Bamako Agreement ended the war; it was reached “through the mediation of Emperor Haile Selassie and Modibo Keita”56 and some Arab League participation. Prior to the Sands War, Algeria had emerged (triumphant) from its war of independence against France, one of the bloodiest such conflicts in Africa with a toll estimated as high as 1.5 million.57 Algeria’s war of independence had unwittingly thrust it to the forefront of anti-imperialism. It won Algeria African and global admiration, but also previewed decolonization battles yet to come. Because it ended before the OAU’s establishment, there was no chance for OAU’s involvement. That the French sought to hold onto Algeria as part of recreating empire was puzzling: after France’s decisive defeat at Bien Dien Phu in Vietnam, the colony ~ 400 miles south and its 1 million French citizens seemed worth defending. Around Algeria, majority Arab and/or Muslim (North) African nations were gaining independence: Libya in 1951, Egypt

53 Hamid Bahri, “Race and Color in North Africa and the Arab Spring.” In Moha Ennaji, Ed., Multiculturalism and Democracy in North Africa: Aftermath of the Arab Spring (New York: Routledge, 2014), 145. 54 Ronald Bruce St John, Historical Dictionary of Libya, 5th ed. (Lanham: Rowman & Littlefield, 2014). 55 Mohamed Fayek, “The July 23 Revolution and Africa.” In Khair El-Din Haseeb, Ed., The Arabs and Africa (RLE: The Arab Nation and New York: Routledge 2012), 105. 56 Michael Brecher and Jonathan Wilkenfeld, A Study of Crisis (Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press, 1997), 439. 57 Martin Evans, Algeria: France’s Undeclared War (New York: Oxford University Press, 2012); Jennifer Johnson, The Battle for Algeria: Sovereignty, Health Care, and Humanitarianism (Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 2016).

5

NATION VS. CONTINENT: SOVEREIGNTY …

169

in 1952, and Sudan, Morocco and Tunisia in 1956. Global geopolitical currents were stacked against French imperial ambitions. From the American perspective, “the only solution for Algeria lay in autonomy or independence. The longer the war continued and Algerian independence was delayed, the more the interests of the world communism were served and the greater the danger of a right-wing coup in France itself.”58 Although the split between the US and France had many causes, such as French objections to West Germany’s NATO and EEC membership, rearmament and US’ refusal to share nuclear technology, France’s unwinnable imperial wars and their impact on global geopolitics were another source. Algeria’s experiences thrust it into the role of a decolonization advocate in ways other North African countries did not. Algeria benefited from collective sympathy in its war; the FLN, Algeria’s leading liberation movement, sent a delegation to the Afro-Asian 1955 Bandung Conference. Algeria’s decolonization and that of other African colonies were ultimately addressed by the UN–South Africa (ANC), Mozambique (FRELIMO), Angola, Chad, Eritrea and modern-day Zimbabwe.59 The Sands War allowed for conflict resolution under OAU’s tutelage. The cease-fire reached was the first instance of institutional collaboration between the OAU and the Arab League. Establishing a demilitarized zone between Algeria and Morocco under the League’s auspices allowed for a speedy conflict resolution. OAU peace mechanisms, in this case, an ad hoc Committee led by Ethiopia’s Emperor Haile Selassie, marked early success for the OAU in conflict resolution. The Ethiopia/Somalia (Ogaden) War(s) If the conflict between Algeria and Morocco was instructive, the Ethiopian-Somali War (the Ogaden War), fought between 1977 and 1978 over the Ogaden region of Ethiopia, was a watershed event. It was a complex conflict; it illustrated the impact of colonialism and its settlements as boundaries retained from European imperialism fired up the next interstate conflict over people, territory and resources. It also pulled in the two major global superpowers, their (or their proxies’) troops and 58 Irwin M. Wall, France, the United States, and the Algerian War (Berkeley: University of California Press, 2001), 23–24. 59 Martin Welz, Integrating Africa: Decolonization’s Legacies, Sovereignty and the African Union (New York: Routledge, 2013).

170

S. M. MAGU

materiel. The pre-war switch in alliances for both nations was an unusual event, but one that often happened with regime changes especially in the Global South. The US had supported Ethiopia and Emperor Haile Selassie going as far back as World War II, but grew ambivalent after his 1974 overthrow by the socialist-leaning Mengistu Haile Mariam. Somalia, previously in the Soviet camp, fell out with its benefactor due to Soviet apprehension over Somalia’s invasion of Ethiopia. To have two countries vying for Soviet support was not an enviable position. The conflict saw 16,000 Cuban troops, 1,600 Soviet military advisors, Yemeni and even North Korean troops and an infusion of an estimated $7 billion in material from the USSR provided to Ethiopia.60 In a now familiar proxy-war trope, “between 200 and 300 Soviet aircraft carrying T-34 tanks, anti-tank guns, mortars, Strela SA-7 missiles and petroleum, arrived in Ethiopia […] 4,000 Cuban, PDR (South) Yemeni, Eastern European and Russian personnel and armed forces came to the aid of the Mengistu regime.”61 The Ogaden War had its origin in ethnic nationalism. Ethiopia’s Ogaden’s control dated back almost a century. Although occupied by predominantly ethnic Somalis, Ogaden had been surrendered to Ethiopia under the 1897 Anglo-Ethiopian Treaty (or Rodd) Treaty signed by Sir Rennell Rodd and Emperor Menelik II.62 “The vast majority of inhabitants of the Ogaden region are Muslim Somalis, and the region remained politically independent until the end of the nineteenth century.”63 During the twentieth century, great power rivalries now consumed the region: they included the Italian invasion of Ethiopia in 1935, ostensibly to ‘rectify’ the horror of the 40-year European humiliation occasioned by the defeat at the hands of Menelik I in 1896. Italy’s massive military forces were routed by a much smaller, combined force of British East African and Ethiopian troops during World War II; it dented Mussolini’s illusions

60 Ephrem Yared, Ethiopian-Somali War Over the Ogaden Region (1977 –1978), (March 21, 2016). 61 Steven Carol, From Jerusalem to the Lion of Judah and Beyond: Israel’s Foreign Policy in E. Africa (Bloomington: iUniv 2012), 244. 62 Stuart Notholt, Fields of Fire: An Atlas of Ethnic Conflict (London: Stuart Northolt Communications, 2008). 63 Notholt, Fields of Fire, 2.22.

5

NATION VS. CONTINENT: SOVEREIGNTY …

171

of grandeur and ended his ‘mare nostrum’ dreams. With Italians properly dispatched, the British briefly administered Ogaden and later folded it into independent Somalia. The 1977–78 Ogaden War was a redo: the first skirmishes (First Ogaden War) occurred in 1963, “following the first systematic attempt by the Ethiopian administration to collect taxes.”64 Opposition to Ethiopian rule in Ogaden was intensified by the Western Somali Liberation Fron’st (WSLF) involvement; WSLF was set up immediately after Somalia became independent and enjoyed significant support from the Somalia government. The Ethiopian government employed several approaches to bring the region to heel: it established military rule with curfews, punitive expeditions and killing of persons and animals, and occasional military incursions into Somalia as a deterrent for its support of the Ogaden region’s separatist attempts.65 Ethiopia stated that it was ‘pacifying’ the region using tactics such as control of water sources, key to the nomadic lifestyle. In 1963, partly in reaction to Ethiopia’s activities and Ogaden peoples’ desire for self-rule, “the Ogaden Liberation Front (OLF) was formed with the intention of progressing Ogaden claims on the basis of union with Somalia,”66 while the Ogaden National Liberation Front (ONLF) “was created [in 1984] to press for Ogaden independence from both Ethiopia and Somalia.”67 OLF and ONLF were only two of more than fourteen liberation organizations dedicated to liberating Ogaden. Others included the Ogaden Republican Army and the Republic of Ogaden.68 Despite complex, often perceptibly inconsistent goals, on the one hand to unify Ogaden and fold it into the Greater Somalia project and on the other, to secede from Ethiopia, Kenya (and parts of Somalia) forming an ethnic, Ogadenclan based enclave, Ogaden sought to unify with Somalia or use the pretext to break from Kenya and Ethiopia but form a separate state. Thus, in the Ogaden War, most scholars consider Somalia to have been the

64 Alexander De Waal, Evil Days: Thirty Years of War and Famine in Ethiopia (New York: Human Rights Watch, 1991), 71. 65 de Waal, Evil Days, 71. 66 Notholt, Fields of Fire, 2–23. 67 Northolt, Fields of Fire, 2–23. 68 James B. Minahan, Encyclopedia of Stateless Nations: Ethnic and National Groups

around the World (Boulder: ABC-CLIO, 2016).

172

S. M. MAGU

aggressor party and supporter of the WSLF, OLF and ONLF, even as the conflict served the interests of the Greater Somalia project, based “upon Somali regions in modern Djibouti, Kenya, and Ogaden.”69 Countries in the Horn of Africa—Ethiopia, twice, Djibouti and Kenya, which had confronted the secessionist ambitions of the Greater Somalia project through the NFD insurrection—were all properly tied together in these conflicts. Ethiopia’s part in the conflict was ironic, seeing as it was the seat of the peace-pursuing OAU and now AU. Slightly over a decade before the Second Ogaden War, the OAU notched an early win during the First Ogaden War in 1964; under a month after the start of OLF-instigated hostilities in the Ogaden region, “on 30 March 1964, the Organization of African Unity announced that it had mediated a cease-fire.”70 Before the OAU-backed cease-fire, Ethiopia and Somalia were in talks and agreed to a cease-fire which Somalia violated by continuing attacks on Ethiopian troops. There was perhaps incentive to agree to a cease-fire; Somalia’s other misadventure in Kenya’s Northern Frontier District (NFD) was sputtering. The OAU’s mediation efforts had UN support,71 although the peace talks outcomes reaffirmed OAU’s position borders’ inviolability and sovereignty. Besides the Liberation Committee’s work, the OAU convened the (occasional) Good Offices Commission and tasked it with urgently resolving the war; it affirmed that “Ogaden is an integral part of Ethiopia.”72 The Second Ogaden War was more challenging across the board. The enthusiastic leaders who led African nations to independence were now mostly gone. The continent had seen many other conflicts: interstate, intrastate, civil wars, secession—it was likely the case too, that the ambivalence in Somalia arose from the OAU being jaded after 15 years of endless conflict resolution. But quickly, the OAU determined that Somalia

69 Northolt, Fields of Fire, 2.22. 70 David H. Shinn and Thomas P. Ofcansky, Historical Dictionary of Ethiopia, Second

Edition (Lanham: Scarecrow Press, 2013), 312. 71 Edmond J. Keller, “Rethinking African Regional Security.” In David A. Lake and Patrick M. Morgan, Eds., Regional Orders: Building Security in a New World (University Park: The Pennsylvania State University Press, 1997). 72 Belete Belachew Yihun, “Ethiopian Foreign Policy and the Ogaden War: The Shift from ‘Containment’ to ‘Destabilization,’ 1977–1991).” In David M. Anderson and Øystein H. Rolandsen, Eds., Politics and Violence in Eastern Africa: The Struggles of Emerging States (New York: Routledge, 2015), 143.

5

NATION VS. CONTINENT: SOVEREIGNTY …

173

was the aggressor and thus was in violation of the tenets of the OAU Charter.73 In spite of this clear-cut violation of Ethiopian territory and sovereignty, the OAU “was reluctant to condemn Somalia.”74 OAU’s actions included being non-committal to the proper resolutions of the conflict, but the warring parties did not help either. Delegations of the warring sides refused to meet, each side expected to win the war and therefore had no incentive to negotiate and this paralysis led to the view of the OAU as “toothless.”75 That “both the UN and the OAU were unenthusiastic about sponsoring negotiations in the Horn”76 didn’t much help the situation. Other regional players were involved in peace negotiations. One of these was IGADD. Yet its lack of enforcement mechanisms, besides suspension of a state’s OAU membership, almost assured less likelihood of success.77 Despite the conflict’s global implications and the Horn’s importance, US’ support “was limited to a call for a peaceful resolution of the conflict, with negotiations led by the OAU.”78 One head-scratching approach by the OAU deserves scrutiny: to resolve ongoing conflicts during the Ogaden War, the OAU Liberation Committee handled peace talks. The committee’s mandate was to aid liberation movements, and Somalia argued that its actions in Ethiopia and Kenya were in support of liberation of Ogaden from Ethiopia.79 Doubts were expressed on the likelihood of the OAU finding a solution to the war: “Mengistu warned that the United States should not ‘expect the OAU to solve the problem.’”80 Somalia’s defeat in the Ogaden War, waged against the USSR’s advice given broader geopolitical considerations, was the beginning of a decline in the unitary Somali state, especially after the USSR backed Ethiopia

73 Guy Arnold, Wars in the Third World Since 1945 (New York: Bloomsbury, 2016). 74 Nancy Mitchell, Jimmy Carter in Africa: Race and the Cold War (Washington, DC:

Woodrow Wilson Center Press, 2016), 292. 75 Mitchell, Jimmy Carter in Africa, 2016. 76 Mitchell, Jimmy Carter in Africa, 2016, 292. 77 Keller, “Rethinking African Regional Security”, 1997. 78 Donna Rose Jackson, US Foreign Policy in The Horn of Africa: From Colonialism to

Terrorism (New York: Routledge, 2018), 144. 79 Assa Okoth, A History of Africa: African Nationalism and the De-colonisation Process, Vol. 2 (Nairobi: EAEP, 2006). 80 Jackson, US Foreign Policy in The Horn of Africa, 140.

174

S. M. MAGU

with preponderance of manpower, men and materiel. In 1990, Somalia rapidly descended into ethnic conflagration, a condition that has persisted to 2020 and likely far beyond. The OAU’s failure to authorize a standby military force now illuminated the cost: despite its involvement in ending the conflict, it unable to enforce a cease-fire. Two decades later, Ethiopia went to war against the World Islamic Courts as part of dealing with the outcomes of state failure. In the case of Somalia, OAU’s efforts produced mixed results: it quickly resolved the First Ogaden War, but the Second Ogaden War had murkier results not informed by OAU’s efforts. Uganda–Tanzania War/Kagera War/ Vita Vya Kagera States’ positions and interests also regularly reflected and dictated their actions, reactions and positions on issues. In the 1978–9 Uganda– Tanzania War (or Kagera War, or Vita vya Kagera), few African states took a stand; indeed, this was one of the first instance of countries likely thinking some power should intervene and no one would really complain. Besides “six leaders – Colonel Mengistu Haile Mariam of Ethiopia, President Didier Ratsiraka of Madagascar, Dr. Antonio Agostinho Neto of Angola, President Seretse Khama of Botswana, President Samora Machel of Mozambique, and President Kenneth Kaunda of Zambia (the last four being leaders of the Frontline States chaired by President Nyerere), no other African leader condemned Amin’s aggression against Tanzania.”81 By the late 1970s, Idi Amin’s antics were a stain on the country, region and continent. Amin regularly violated Ugandan citizens’ human rights including deporting Asians, issuing a regular stream of threats to invade Kenya, collaborated—however well-intentioned—with Libya, state sponsors of terrorism, rebel groups and even groups labeled as terrorists, allowed the Air France Flight 139 debacle and PFLP holding Israeli hostages in Uganda, heightened regional issues and hastened the breakup of the EAC, and fomented general instability in the region, producing wholly palpable regional and continental frustration. In the specific case of the Uganda–Tanzania War, African countries recommended “a ceasefire; an end to territorial claims against neighboring countries; withdrawal of troops to the recognised borders, and adherence to the OAU Charter, 81 Okon Eminue, “Conflict Development in the African Region.” In Celestine Bassey and Oshita O. Oshita, Eds., Governance and Border Security in Africa (Lagos: Malthouse Press Limited, 2010), 100.

5

NATION VS. CONTINENT: SOVEREIGNTY …

175

particularly its provisions on non-interference in the internal affairs of other states and respect for the sovereignty and inviolability of borders of member states.”82 The war was decidedly complex. There were the close links between Uganda and Libya and by extension, the PLO. Libya supplied and transported materiel and troops (including PLO fighters). With the PLFP debacle that had ended in Amin’s humiliation, and his own professing of Muslim faith, Amin aligned himself with the north and Middle Eastern countries; it appeared that he was arraying an impressive collection of alliances. Kenya, a potential Tanzanian ally, was not a major party to the Uganda–Tanzania War despite Amin’s 1973 half-jest that Uganda’s borders extended to Naivasha. Kenya’s situation may have been informed by the political transition: Jomo Kenyatta passed away on August 22, 1978, two months before the shooting war between Uganda and Tanzania started. The internal leadership intrigues might not have lent themselves to involvement in foreign wars. Yet as was largely evident in this—and other—African interstate conflicts, such as the Ogaden War, the Cold War, global dimension to conflicts that were essentially local, sometimes deriving from skirmishes, misunderstandings, strongmen with imperial if misguided ambitions (such as Idi Amin), strongmen with continental illusions (Gaddafi), foreign powers used as pawns in the Cold War (Palestinian involvement in Uganda or Cuban involvement in Angola) were quick to manifest, further confounding possible and practical responses by OAU members to these events. Reflecting the age-old wisdom of the good Count Klemens von Metternich and Swahili wisdom that “mtego wa panya huingia waliomo na wasiokuwamo” (translation: the rat trap tends to catch all, rats and other creatures), all wars tend to grow in scope; African wars were not only local and regional; they became continental with global flavor. Thus, Palestinians found themselves fighting Tanzanians on the side of Uganda, thousands of miles removed from their primary cause and from Palestine. PLO leader Yasser Arafat’s primary support was for Libya’s Gaddafi, but the age-old adage of friends of friends, and Uganda’s role in the PFLP resonated. Gaddafi’s support for Amin during the Uganda–Tanzania arose from the view that Amin was defending a Muslim nation from Christian

82 Eminue, “Conflict development in the African region”, 100.

176

S. M. MAGU

crusaders given Amin’s conversion to Islam.83 US involvement was more complex: it disliked both Amin and Gaddafi, but considered Tanzania a socialist state in the Sino-Soviet column in the Cold War context. For the US, it was a no-win, lesser-of-the-three-evils situation. Involvement of Israel’s arch-nemesis, the PLO (labeled as a terrorist organization) may have made the US’ distaste for Tanzania less. Arafat sent troops to aid Uganda, and considering PLO / PFLP / Entebbe / Libya / Amin, a Uganda–Tanzania tiff assumed ominously global proportions. The British desired influence and potential benefit from the war’s outcomes: increase its post-empire stature and put paid to Amin’s embarrassment. Its official position was that it condemned “the Ugandan invasion and have conveyed an expression of sympathy to the Tanzanian government. We hope there will be an early end to the fighting and that a peaceful settlement can be quickly achieved based on the OAU principle of respect for territorial integrity. […] We believe African disputes should, wherever possible, be settled in an African context.”84 Everyone thanked Uganda when Amin fled to Saudi Arabia. Unraveling Imperial Misdeeds: Ethiopia vs. Eritrea Nowhere are the processes and consequences of colonialism more significant than in the Ethiopia/Eritrea debacle. As a target, emblem of resistance, example of sovereignty and home to Africa’s continental institutions and oft-pawn in great power rivalry, Ethiopia towers above most African nations. Despite avoiding colonization, Ethiopia was unable to escape the conflicts driven of convoluted colonial maps, in its case featuring Eritrea. Eritrea’s march to self-rule was long and drawn out, beginning with Italian rule and the duplicity illustrated elsewhere. Eritrea was occupied by Italy progressively from 1869 to 1890, establishing ‘effective occupation’ per meaning of the Berlin Conference.85 Eritrea’s colonization by Italy marked one of the rarer instances when unlike 83 Tony Avirgan and Martha Honey, War in Uganda: The Legacy of Idi Amin (Dar es

Salaam: Tanzania Publishing House, 1983). 84 Elisabeth Stennes Skaar, Great Britain’s Policy on the Uganda-Tanzania War (1978– 9): A Profound Lack of Confidence as a Major Power? Master’s History thesis (Trondheim: NTNU-Trondheim, 2015), 25. 85 Jérémie Gilbert, Indigenous Peoples’ Land Rights Under International Law: From Victims to Actors (Ardsley: Transnational 2006).

5

NATION VS. CONTINENT: SOVEREIGNTY …

177

its other compatriot colonial powers of Europe, Italy actually managed to deceive, mislead, conquer and colonize parts of Africa (in addition to Libya and Italian Somaliland). Buoyed by this acquisition, Italy desired to expand its influence by colonizing Ethiopia with marginal success: Ethiopia, “during the five-year Italian occupation, was never fully controlled by the Italians outside the main towns.”86 Mohanty and Andemichael argue that Italy’s decision to acquire colonies in Africa stemmed from a combination of domestic and global factors. It was also as a way to establish itself as an equal among peers, a rising, powerful imperialist power; this assertiveness was especially important in the period after Italian unification in the 1860s. Global factors, especially world trade and scientific (medical) discoveries, increased Italy’s population dramatically, without a corresponding change in territory necessary to provide sufficient food supplies to sustain the population.87 Such territory could be acquired on the continent considered terra nullius . For Eritrea creeping colonialism was initiated, similarly to other regions and models of colonization from India to Rhodesia, with multinational trading companies establishing forts under the pretext of resupplying their ships and coordination of trade. In Italy’s case, it was the Rubatino Shipping Company that established a trading post; “the Italian government bought a tract adjoining the small village of Assab, just inside Bab Al Mandab, for 8,100 M.T. dollars”88 in 1869. Gradually, the government expanded its control of Eritrea as a producer territory, settled poor Italians, and started extracting raw material and manpower in terms of soldiers.89 After successfully occupying Aseb, Italians now turned to the larger prize: Ethiopia. The Treaty of Uccialli concluded in 1889, complete with the well-worn trickery that produced two versions of the treaty. The Italian version held that Ethiopia was its protectorate, and that trade, foreign affairs and other critical functions of the state would be conducted

86 David Forgacs, Italy’s Margins: Social Exclusion and Nation Formation since 1861 (Cambridge: Cambridge University, 2014), 82. 87 Pramod Kumar Mohanty and Aron Andemichael, “Colonialism and Land in Africa: A Case of Italian Land Policy in Eritrean Highlands.” Proceedings of the Indian History Congress, Vol. 71 (2010–2011): 950–958. 88 Mohanty and Andemichael, “Colonialism and Land in Africa”, 950. 89 Mohanty and Andemichael, “Colonialism and Land in Africa”, 950.

178

S. M. MAGU

by Italy, hence effective occupation. The Ethiopian version allowed Italians occupation of Asmara, but most certainly did not suggest that the “Ethiopians might, at their option, employ Italy to conduct diplomacy for their country.”90 Inevitably, the different interpretations of the treaty almost assured that a conflict would inevitably ensue. It did. In the shadow of Menelik’s power contest with Ras Mengesha Yohannes, the Negus of Showa, Menelik II consolidated his power and sent troops to help Yohannes fight the Italians; Mengesha’s territory was in the northeast of Ethiopia, today the area around Eritrea.91 Menelik signaled that he would not accept Italy’s colonization. The Battle of Adwa is generally considered a highlight-reel event: the first time an African army had soundly routed a European power, aided by European/Russian-supplied weapons, well-trained troops, tactics and numbers in Menelik’s army. Besides resisting colonization and illustrating the plausible destructibility of European militaries, the Italian defeat at the Battle of Adwa ensured that Italy’s place in Europe was that much more diminished, while in Italy, the government of the day was forced to resign. Ethiopia had, for the time being, retained its autonomy, and Eritrea would spend the next six decades or so as an Italian colony, governed under the auspices of “The Colony of Erythrea.”92 During World War II, Italy’s alliance with Axis powers, its less-than-illustrious campaigns centered on Libya, and meant to occupy and conquer Egypt and Ethiopia, establishing a line of territorial holdings from Italy through North Africa and the Horn therefore turning the Mediterranean as its ‘backyard lake,’ its inability to successfully wage war (the North African campaign was run by the ‘desert fox’ German Field Marshal Erwin Rommel), and their subsequent defeat everywhere, ensured that Italy’s illusions of empire would come to a screeching halt really quickly. Defeated in war, Italy gave up its effective control of its African colonies between 1947 and 1960.93

90 James S. Olson, Ed., Historical Dictionary of European Imperialism (New York: Greenwood Press, 1991), 204. 91 Vestal, Theodore, “Reflections on the Battle of Adwa and Its Significance for Today.” In Paulos Milkias and Getachew Metaferia, Eds., The Battle of Adwa: Reflections on Ethiopia’s Historic Victory Against European Colonialism (New York: Algora, 2005). 92 George Fitz-Hardinge Berkeley, The Campaign of Adowa and the Rise of Menelik (London: Archibald Constable, 1902), 24. 93 M. K. G, “Italy in Africa.” The World Today 4, no. 2 (1948): 62–73.

5

NATION VS. CONTINENT: SOVEREIGNTY …

179

Eritrea’s path to independence went through global politics and their aftermath: after the axis defeat by the allied powers, including in East Africa, territories controlled by the axis were quickly taken or retaken by the victorious powers. It was the end of ‘Africa Orientale Italiana’—Italian East Africa, and despite British desires to add Ethiopia to their East African colonial holdings and thus fulfill Rhodes’ Cape-toCairo dream, US relations with Ethiopia and its anti-imperialist position ensured that Ethiopia retained its independence. Eritrea’s case was slightly different: “from 1941 to 1947, Eritrea remained under the British Middle East Command.”94 The victorious allied powers deliberated the fate of Italian possessions given its defeat, whereupon it surrendered claims to these territories. That was perhaps the easy part; the victorious allies were unable to determine the fate of Eritrea until 1949’s ‘Bevin-Sforza formula’95 which provided for the division of Libya into three, while allowing Italy to retain control of Italian Somaliland, was finalized. Eritrea’s fate was decided, producing a most unfortunate outcome: it was “to be partitioned between the Anglo-Egyptian Sudan and Ethiopia […] Ethiopia’s claim to Eritrea was based on arguments about the need of access to the sea.”96 As the question of Eritrea’s fate lingered, there was little collective action by African states—and the OAU did not exist. Inevitably, the issue of resolving the question of Ethiopia/Eritrea mirrored that of the Hindi Raj and Palestine—its solution was left up to the good offices of a United Nations commission. The UN commission produced two plans: “the minority plan, endorsed by Guatemala and Pakistan, provided for an independent Eritrea after a period of UN trusteeship. The majority plan, favored by Burma and South Africa, provided for the federation of Eritrea with Ethiopia, while Norway proposed the union of Eritrea and Ethiopia.”97 Ultimately, without granting it independence, the General Assembly approved of the plan to join Ethiopia and Eritrea with separate government functions for Ethiopia and Eritrea. It is ironic, that the

94 Semere Haile, “Historical Background to the Ethiopia-Eritrea Conflict.” In Lionel Cliffe and Basil Davidson, Eds., The Long Struggle of Eritrea for Independence and Constructive Peace (Trenton: The Red Sea Press, Inc., 1988), 18. 95 Haile, “Historical background to the Ethiopia-Eritrea Conflict”, 1988. 96 Haile, “Historical background to the Ethiopia-Eritrea Conflict”, 20. 97 Haile, “Historical Background to the Ethiopia-Eritrea Conflict”, 21.

180

S. M. MAGU

Eritrean war of independence commenced in September 1961, considering that in 1962, Eritrea’s legislative assembly voted to join (integrate into) Ethiopia fully, although some Eritrean citizens began a conflict that would span nearly three decades.98 The conflict stemmed from the alternative view: that although according to Ethiopia, Eritrea was one of its nine provinces, the view from Asmara was different: Ethiopia had annexed Eritrea, and a desirable, even demanded course of action by the rebels was for the UN to condemn Ethiopia and move Eritrea to independence.99 It is perhaps inopportune to suggest that Ethiopia should have respected the sovereignty, the freedom to make decisions for Eritrea, particularly given its position that it ought to move toward independence rather than federation. But if Ethiopia considered Eritrea its province, then one surmises that it was not bound by rules governing interstate relations. Still, Ethiopia was determined to demonstrate that Eritrea was, and wanted to be, part of Ethiopia. According to a confessed Eritrean independence proponent, “with the help of a small band of Ethiopian collaborators, Ethiopia created, nurtured and used a vassal political movement, the Unionist Party (UP), to agitate for union with Ethiopia and subvert Eritrean aspirations for self-determination.”100 Eritrea’s efforts were also helped along by the UN Four Power Commission, whose indirect elections of 1947 appeared to survey representatives drawn from different villages on the ‘least worst options’; 48% of those elected favored the Unionist party, 43% pro-independence parties and 9% to return to Italian rule.101 It is worth noting that elections might have put the fear of God into representatives through clergy, who “threatened excommunication, and refused baptism, marriage and funeral services to all Eritreans in favor of independence.”102

98 Terrence Lyons, “Eritrea: The Independence Struggle and the Struggles of Independence.” In Jon B. Alterman and Will Todman, Eds., Independence Movements and Their Aftermath: Self -Determination and the Struggle for Success (Lanham: Rowman & Littlefield, 2019). 99 Dan Connell and Tom Killion, Historical Dictionary of Eritrea, (Lanham: The Scarecrow Press, Inc., 2011). 100 Andebrhan Welde Giorgis, Eritrea at a Crossroads: A Narrative of Triumph, Betrayal and Hope (Houston: Strategic Book Publishing and Rights Co., 2014), 74. 101 Roy Pateman, Eritrea: Even the Stones are Burning (Lawrenceville: The Red Sea Press, Inc, 1991). 102 Pateman, Eritrea, 1991, 69.

5

NATION VS. CONTINENT: SOVEREIGNTY …

181

A 30-year war of independence was waged by Eritrea against Ethiopia, led by a number of independence-minded groups. The progenitor of these was the Eritrean Liberation Movement (ELM), founded in 1958 in Sudan.103 It was later be supplanted by the Cairo-based Eritrean Liberation Front (ELF) and the Eritrean Liberation Army (ELA). Liberation groups rose, consolidated, folded and transformed: the previous groups organized themselves into the Eritrean People’s Liberation Front (EPLF), with a military wing, the Eritrean People’s Liberation Army (EPLA).104 Ultimately, after the overthrow of Emperor Haile Selassie by the Derg, saw the rise of a new group, the Tigray People’s Liberation Front. Over time, even pro-independence movements began warring among themselves, particularly the ELF and EPLF, the latter taking over all of Eritrea by the early 1990s. Further, as a result of the fall of the Marxist-Leninist Derg and the ascent to power by the Ethiopian People’s Revolutionary Democratic Front (EPRDF), the EPLF “proclaimed a two year transitional period which would end in a referendum on independence.”105 The subsequent referendum question, procured under EPLF’s tutelage, almost mirrored the choices advanced by the 1947 Four Powers commission: “remaining with Ethiopia, federalism, and independence.”106 The 1993 referendum’s results were clear: 99.8% voted in favor of independence, and the UN certified the validity of the results. Eritrea became Africa’s 53rd independent state.107 After declaring independence, Eritrea started asserting itself regionally, continentally and on the global state. Ethiopia, despite losing a ‘province,’ recognized Eritrea’s independence first.108 The trend in new countries 103 Tom Cooper and Adrien Fontanellaz, Ethiopian-Eritrean Wars. Volume 2: Eritrean War of Independence, 1988–1991 & Badme War, 1998–2001 (Warwick: Helion & Company Limited, 2018). 104 Cooper and Fontanellaz, Ethiopian-Eritrean Wars, 2018. 105 Kjetil Tronvoll and Daniel Rezene Mekonnen, African Garrison State: Human

Rights and Political Development in Eritrea (Suffolk: James Currey, 2014), 7. 106 Andreas Eshete, “Why Ethio-Eritrean Relations Matter: A Plea for Future Political Affiliation.” In Amare Tekle, Ed., Eritrea and Ethiopia: From Conflict to Cooperation (Lawrenceville: The Red Sea Press, 1994), 24. 107 Terrence Lyons, “Eritrea: The Independence Struggle and the Struggles of Independence.” In Jon B. Alterman and Will Todman, Eds., Independence Movements and Their Aftermath: Self -Determination and the Struggle for Success (Lanham: Rowman & Littlefield, 2019), 4. 108 Lyons, “Eritrea”, 2019.

182

S. M. MAGU

was mostly internal conflict, but Eritrea’s conflict was against Yemen over the status of the Greater Hanish Island located in the Red Sea. Was it territorially Yemeni, or Eritrean? Eritrea’s tactics assured that the matter would likely escalate into an armed conflict; however, it did both—appeal to the ICJ to determine the ownership of about 200 islands—and invaded Greater Hanish and occupied it.109 The UN intervened and ultimately, its judicial arm, the ICJ ruled in favor of Yemen. But Eritrea was not done yet: it was readying for war against Ethiopia, over disputed territory and borders. As a province of Ethiopia, the location of borders might not have been as important, but now, with its rather constrained size, Eritrea was determined to possess and rule all its perceived territory. Progressively, Eritrea’s interstate conflicts spread, to include “armed clashes with three of its neighbours (Sudan, Djibouti and Yemen); [and] waged the biggest and most devastating bilateral war on the African continent in recent decades, with Ethiopia (1998–2000).”110 On the Ethiopia-Eritrea War that started on May 6, 1998, Jabbink argues that the conflict took “everybody by surprise, including Ethiopian Prime Minister Meles Zenawi.”111 What was clear was that Eritrean troops crossed the border into Ethiopia and occupied the village of Badme, whose inhabitants had a compelling claim to Ethiopian citizenship and residence: “they had always paid taxes to Ethiopia and had been politically and judicially administered by Ethiopian authorities.”112 The conflict quickly escalated and spread to other cities in Ethiopia’s Tigray Province, which borders Eritrea to the north. Before reflecting on the cease-fire that was eventually reached between Eritrea and Ethiopia, it should be remembered that the 1990s is the decade often characterized by unrivaled preponderance of US power, following the end of the Cold War and the collapse of the Soviet Union; it was therefore understandable that the US brokered a moratorium on air strikes and a decline in ground

109 Martin Plaut, Understanding Eritrea: Inside Africa’s Most Repressive State (Oxford: OUP, 2016). 110 Kjetil Tronvoll and Daniel Rezene Mekonnen, African Garrison State: Human Rights and Political Development in Eritrea (Suffolk: James Currey, 2014), 8. 111 J Abbink, “Briefing: The Eritrean-Ethiopian Border Dispute.” African Affairs, vol. 97, no. 389 (October, 1998): 551. 112 Abbink, “Briefing”, 551.

5

NATION VS. CONTINENT: SOVEREIGNTY …

183

fighting,113 leading to “a US-brokered peace plan adopted by the Organization of African Unity and endorsed by the European Union and the UN.”114 In spite of American leadership on resolving the conflict between Eritrea and Ethiopia, the OAU was involved, including by sending a “mission of ambassadors from Burkina Faso, Zimbabwe, Rwanda and Djibouti […] to investigate the reasons for this unexpected and tragic war, to collect information about the disputed areas and to establish the facts of the events over the past year leading up to the outbreak of fighting.”115 Eritrea’s boundary claims were based on one of OAU’s position on borders: “its government maintains the importance of its colonial boundaries, and it maintains that it is not making any territorial claims further than the beyond colonial borders, making it a test-case for the OAU, stressing the need for demarcation and delineation wherever needed.”116 Like other African countries, colonial-era borders emphasized if they favored a country; this was true of agreements, e.g., Ethiopia’s opposition to the Nile waters Anglo-Egyptian treaty. Besides the Ministerial delegation, the conflict was also addressed by the 34th Ordinary Session of the Assembly of Heads of State and Government Summit in Ouagadougou, Burkina Faso, in 1998, endorsing the previous peacemaking efforts. Indeed, it appeared there was an overwhelming level of support for a negotiated peace; although the EthiopiaEritrea conflict was not strictly an ethnic conflict, a mere four years previously, the world had stood by as the Rwanda genocide unfolded; conflicts elsewhere in the former Yugoslavia reflected a global effort to find peace. Lata notes the overwhelming global response to this conflict, writing that “the US Government which participated in the initial articulation of the proposals not only continued backing them, but also reinforced all subsequent OAU efforts to operationalise them. The EU

113 Abbink, “Briefing”, 552–553. 114 Dan Connell, “Shootout in the Horn of Africa: A View from Eritrea,” Middle

East Report, No. 210, Reform or Reaction? Dilemmas of Economic Development in the Middle East (Spring, 1999), 4. 115 Ragnhild Ek, “Why? The Eritrean-Ethiopian Conflict.” Review of African Political Economy, vol. 25, no. 77, Britain’s African Policy: Ethical, or Ignorant? (September, 1998): 508. 116 Ek, “Why?” 509.

184

S. M. MAGU

too gave all out support to the OAU-led mediation effort.”117 Ultimately, the 2000 peace agreement set forth an ‘unnamed’ UN body, the EritreaEthiopia Boundary Commission (EEBC), a Claims Commission, a UN Mission in Ethiopia and Eritrea (UNMEE) and established a Temporary Security Zone (TSZ) with cease-fire positions set to those held before the beginning of the conflict. The Eritrea-Ethiopia War was followed by the founding of the AU as the successor to the OAU, complete with a Peace and Security Council with “the right to intervene in a member state in respect of grave circumstances, namely war crimes, genocide and crimes against humanity […] and the right of member states to request intervention from the Union in order to restore peace and security.”118 This position reflected global trends with respect to the Responsibility to Protect (R2P) and a more interventionist African posture. At the same time, the growth of the importance of regional organizations was evident, in this case especially, IGAD. Eritrea had joined IGADD in 1993. IGADD was reconfigured and its mandate expanded to include peace and security beginning 1995. Ultimately, in the ashes of the war with Ethiopia, Eritrea left the organization in 2007, but rejoined it in 2011. Ultimately, the territorial dispute that led to the war between Eritrea and Ethiopia was decided upon not by the good offices of the AU or IGAD, but by the Eritrea-Ethiopia Boundary Commission (EEBC), under the auspices of the Algiers Agreement, seated at The Hague (the Permanent Court of Arbitration) as the registry, by reaffirming the 1964 OAU Cairo Summit’s principle of uti possidetis —“the principle of respect for the borders existing at independence119 ” and defined by the colonial treaties of 1900, 1902 and 1908, and the automatic binding emplacement of EEBC-demarcated pillars in November 2007 absent both parties’ resolution. All told, the Eritrea-Ethiopia war marked one of those instances where the OAU’s involvement in the resolution of the war and its precipitating

117 Leenco Lata, “The Ethiopia-Eritrea War,” Review of African Political Economy, vol.

30, no. 97 (September, 2003): 381. 118 Sally Healy, “Seeking Peace and Security in the Horn of Africa: The Contribution of the Inter-Governmental Authority on Development.” International Affairs (Royal Institute of International Affairs 1944–), vol. 87, no. 1 (January, 2011): 106. 119 Permanent Court of Arbitration, “Eritrea-Ethiopia Boundary Commission,” Cases, (Web), n.p.

5

NATION VS. CONTINENT: SOVEREIGNTY …

185

factors was present, but overshadowed by global winds of conflict resolution, but also in the context of Rwanda, Yugoslavia and the hegemonic power of the United States. The conflict also illustrated the challenges that confronted the OAU (and later the AU); the retention of colonialera boundaries on occasion produced conflicts as both sides asserted their right to control territory and peoples; further, in instances where boundaries were not obvious to one party or another, or where colonial boundaries were demarcated between territories controlled by the selfsame power, e.g., Uganda and Kenya Colony, the likelihood of obfuscation, confusion and conflict was undeniable. The conflict also showed the limitations of the OAU as it was constituted at the time, lacking mechanisms to resolve especially armed conflicts.

Concluding Thoughts Once European empires started falling to African countries’ independence, cooperation that facilitated liberation frayed, turning oppositional. The new, imagined states revived pre-colonial ethnic schisms or discovered new ones. Groups that once regularly fought each other now found themselves united as citizens but with recent European-infused divisions, and new grudges to settle. Some countries’ ethnic groups were scattered across borders—now policed by perceptions of the nature of states, limiting travel, cooperation and other pre-colonial communal activities. New citizens and families across sovereign borders found themselves under different jurisdictions. In Kenya and Tanzania, the Maasai were divided across borders determined by the British and Germans in 1885. In the northeast, Somalis were scattered across Somalia, Kenya, Ethiopia and Djibouti. The desire to unite Somalis based on nationalism reflected European nineteenth-century consolidation; this would require restructuring colonial borders against the OAU’s 1964 Cairo Declaration. The new nations sought to promote nationalism based on shared commonalities, a task unable to surmount heightened ethnic awareness. Developing a non-ethnicity-based nationalism might be possible, but colonialism had made this less likely. Pre-colonial feuds and renewed ethnic differences converted into civil wars. Global geopolitical factors, especially the Cold War, added fuel to the fire. Interference in the internal affairs of sovereign nations ran the entire gamut: from European attempts to retain, re-establish or expand control over former colonies (e.g., Belgium and Congo, especially Katanga), to new powers angling

186

S. M. MAGU

for resources (US support for Belgium in Congo). New influence was sought; proxy wars saw Cuban, Yemeni, Palestinian, North Korean and Vietnamese troops fighting in the Congo, Angola Uganda and Ethiopia. Africa was now part of the big leagues. Through these challenges, the OAU tried, often succeeded, but mostly failed to resolve the conflicts. Some conflicts arose from split homogeneous groups, while placing other incompatible groups—even from a European colonization perspective (e.g., in Cameroon) in the same country. OAU’s challenges were exacerbated by dominant figures and personalities in African and global leaders, pursuing specific, often personal agendas, undermining leaders in neighboring countries, supporting insurgencies and conflicts, or by African leaders whose PanAfrican commitment was suspect, having served the foreign powers and leading countries divorcing from colonial powers. The alternative RECs, RTAs and continental mechanisms diverted meager resources, split commitments and divided loyalties. In most regions, leaders’ commitment to RECs and RTAs outstripped the lip service paid to the OAU and its goals, particularly toward pacific settlement of disputes. OAU’s first decade of the existence saw limited success resolving conflicts. Countries’ fidelity to peace, settling conflicts through mediation failed often. Ethiopia, the seat of the OAU, cheerfully waged war on Somalia and was party to conflict in Eritrea resulting in its secession. Even peaceful countries such as Tanzania found themselves fighting the aggression of expansionist nations like Uganda, which had support from Libya and Palestine and was considered a crusader against Christian capitalist nations. The OAU’s silence surrounding such actions was most telling. The OAU’s first decade and Africa’s independence was not looking promising, although the resolution of the Sands War demonstrated how leading figures, country, regional, continental and international and even transcontinental, issue-based IGOs could collaborate in the pursuit of peace. Perhaps peace, cooperation, development and harmonious living were, after all, possible.

References Abbink, J. “Briefing: The Eritrean-Ethiopian Border Dispute.” African Affairs, Vol. 97, No. 389 (October, 1998): 551–565. https://www.jstor.org/stable/ 723345.

5

NATION VS. CONTINENT: SOVEREIGNTY …

187

Adar, Korwa G., Monica K. Juma and Katabaro Miti. The State of Africa 2010/11: Parameters and Legacies of Governance and Issue Areas. Pretoria: Africa Institute of South Africa, 2010. African Union. “Intergovernmental Authority for Development (IGAD).” African Union, 11 November 2019. Aminzade, Ronald. Race, Nation, and Citizenship in Postcolonial Africa: The Case of Tanzania. New York: Cambridge University Press, 2013. Araim, Amer and Salih Nibras M. Araim. Intergovernmental Commodity Organizations and the New International Economic Order. New York: Praeger, 1991. Arnold, Guy. Wars in the Third World Since 1945. New York: Bloomsbury Publishing Plc, 2016. Asamoah, Obed Yao. The Political History of Ghana (1950–2013): The Experience of a Non-Conformist. Bloomington: AuthorHouse, 2014. Asante, S.K.B. Regionalism and Africa’s Development: Expectations, Reality and Challenges. Hampshire: Macmillan Press Ltd, 1997. Barkan, Joshua. Corporate Sovereignty: Law and Government under Capitalism. Minneapolis: The University of Minnesota Press, 2013. Bangura, Yusuf. Britain and Commonwealth Africa: The Politics of Economic Relations, 1951–75. Dover: Manchester University Press, 1983. Berkeley, George Fitz-Hardinge. The Campaign of Adowa and the Rise of Menelik. London: Archibald Constable & Co. Ltd, 1902. Betts, Raymond F. Assimilation and Association in French Colonial Theory, 1890– 1914. Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 2005. Brecher, Michael and Jonathan Wilkenfeld. A Study of Crisis. Ann Arbor: UMich Press, 1997. Carol, Steven. From Jerusalem to the Lion of Judah and Beyond: Israel’s Foreign Policy in East Africa. Bloomington: iUniverse, Inc., 2012. ˇ Cervenka, Zdenek. “The Need for a Continental Approach to the Problems of African Land-Locked States.” In Land-locked Countries of Africa. Edited by ˇ Zdenek Cervenka. Uppsala: Nordiska afrikainstitutet, 1973. The Commonwealth. “About us.” The Commonwealth. https://thecommonwea lth.org/about-us. Commonwealth Secretariat, “The London Declaration.” The Commonwealth. http://www.thecommonwealth.org/document/181889/34293/35468/ 214257/londondeclaration.htm on November 14, 2019. Connell, Dan. “Shootout in the Horn of Africa: A View from Eritrea,” Middle East Report, No. 210, Reform or Reaction? Dilemmas of Economic Development in the Middle East (Spring, 1999): 4–5. https://www.jstor.org/stable/ 3012491. Connell, Dan and Tom Killion. Historical Dictionary of Eritrea. Lanham: The Scarecrow Press, Inc., 2011.

188

S. M. MAGU

Cooper, Tom and Adrien Fontanellaz. Ethiopian-Eritrean Wars. Vol. 2: Eritrean War of Independence, 1988–1991 & Badme War, 1998–2001. Warwick: Helion & Co., 2018. De Waal, Alexander. Evil Days: Thirty Years of War and Famine in Ethiopia. New York: HRW, 1991. Derrick, Jonathan. “Looking Back to ‘France of 100 Million Inhabitants’: Roots of the Present in Colonial French Africa.” In Contesting Historical Divides in Francophone Africa. Edited by Claire Griffiths. Chester: University of Chester Press, 2013. Egudu, Romanus N. Modern African Poetry and the African Predicament. London: Macmillan, 1978. Ek, Ragnhild. “Why? The Eritrean-Ethiopian Conflict,” Review of African Political Economy, Vol. 25, No. 77, Britain’s African Policy: Ethical, or Ignorant? (September, 1998): 508–526. https://www.jstor.org/stable/4006510. Eminue, Okon. “Conflict development in the African region.” In Governance and Border Security in Africa. Edited by Celestine Bassey and Oshita O. Oshita. Lagos: Malthouse Press, 2010. Eshete, Andreas. “Why Ethio-Eritrean Relations Matter: A Plea for Future Political Affiliation.” In Eritrea and Ethiopia: From Conflict to Cooperation. Edited by Amare Tekle. Lawrenceville: The Red Sea Press, 1994. Evans, Martin. Algeria: France’s Undeclared War. New York: Oxford University Press, 2012. Fayek, Mohamed. “The July 23 Revolution and Africa.” In The Arabs and Africa, RLE: The Arab Nation. Edited by Khair El-Din Haseeb. New York: Routledge 2012. Francis M. Deng, Sadikiel Kimaro, Terrence Lyons, Donald Rothchild and I. William Zartman. Sovereignty as Responsibility: Conflict Management in Africa. Washington, DC: Brookings, 1996. Fredland, R. A. “OCAM: One Scene in the Drama of West African Development.” In African Regional Organizations. Edited by Domenico Mazzeo. New York: Cambridge University Press, 2014. Frindéthié, K. Martial. Francophone African Cinema: History, Culture, Politics and Theory. Jefferson: McFarland & Co., 2009. Forgacs, David. Italy’s Margins: Social Exclusion and Nation Formation since 1861. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2014. Gilbert, Jérémie. Indigenous Peoples’ Land Rights Under International Law: From Victims to Actors. Ardsley: Transnational Publishers, 2006. Ginio, Ruth French. Colonialism Unmasked: The Vichy Years in French West Africa. Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 2006. Giorgis, Andebrhan Welde. Eritrea at a Crossroads: A Narrative of Triumph, Betrayal and Hope. Houston: Strategic Book Publishing and Rights, 2014.

5

NATION VS. CONTINENT: SOVEREIGNTY …

189

Gonzalez, Edward and Kevin F. McCarthy. Cuba After Castro: Legacies, Challenges, and Impediments. Santa Monica: RAND Corp., 2004. Haile, Semere. “Historical Background to the Ethiopia-Eritrea Conflict.” In The Long Struggle of Eritrea for Independence and Constructive Peace. Edited by Lionel Cliffe and Basil Davidson. Trenton: The Red Sea Press, Inc., 1988. Halliday, Fred. Revolution and Foreign Policy: The Case of South Yemen, 1967– 1987 . New York: Cambridge University Press, 1990. Healy, Sally. “Seeking Peace and Security in the Horn of Africa: The Contribution of the Inter-Governmental Authority on Development.” International Affairs (Royal Institute of International Affairs 1944–), Vol. 87, No. 1 (2011): 105– 120. https://www.jstor.org/stable/20869613. Howland, Douglas and Luise White. “Introduction: Sovereignty and the Study of States,” In The State of Sovereignty: Territories, Laws, Population. Edited by Douglas Howland and Luise White. Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 2009. Jackson, Donna Rose. US Foreign Policy in The Horn of Africa: From Colonialism to Terrorism. New York: Routledge, 2018. James Stuart Olson, Ed., Historical Dictionary of European Imperialism, New York: Greenwood, 1991. Jerónimo, Miguel Bandeira. The ‘Civilising Mission’ of Portuguese Colonialism, 1870–1930. New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2015. Johnson, Jennifer. The Battle for Algeria: Sovereignty, Health Care, and Humanitarianism. Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 2016. Jonas, Raymond. The Battle of Adwa. Cambridge: Belknap Press, 2011. de Jouvenel, Bertrand. Sovereignty: An Inquiry into the Political Good. Cambridge: Cambridge, 1957. Keller, Edmond J. “Rethinking African Regional Security,” In Regional Orders: Building Security in a New World. Edited by David A. Lake and Patrick M. Morgan. University Park: Penn State University Press, 1997. Krasner, Stephen D. Sovereignty: Organized Hypocrisy. Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1999. Lata, Leenco. “The Ethiopia-Eritrea War,” Review of African Political Economy, Vol. 30, No. 97, The Horn of Conflict (September, 2003): 369–388. https:// www.jstor.org/stable/4006982. Laski, Harold Joseph. Studies in the Problem of Sovereignty. New Haven: Yale University Press, 1932. Legum, Colin. Africa Since Independence. Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1999. Lister, Marjorie. The European Union and the South: Relations with Developing Countries. New York: Routledge, 1997. Longman, Timothy. Memory and Justice in Post-Genocide Rwanda. New York: Cambridge, 2017.

190

S. M. MAGU

Lyons, Terrence. “Can Neighbors Help? Regional Actors and African Conflict Management.” In African Reckoning: A Quest for Good Governance. Edited by Francis M. Deng and Terrence Lyons. Washington, DC: Brookings, 1998. Lyons, Terrence. “Eritrea: The Independence Struggle and the Struggles of Independence.” In Independence Movements and Their Aftermath: SelfDetermination and the Struggle for Success. Edited by Jon B. Alterman and Will Todman. Lanham: Rowman & Littlefield, 2019. Magliveras, Konstantinos D. and Gino J. Naldi. The African Union, The Netherlands: Kluwer, 2018. Margariti, Stella. Defining International Terrorism: Between State Sovereignty and Cosmopolitanism. The Hague: Asser Press, 2017. Mazzeo, Domenico. “Introduction: the regional trend.” In African Regional Organizations. Edited by Domenico Mazzeo. New York: Cambridge University Press, 2014. Minahan, James B. Encyclopedia of Stateless Nations: Ethnic and National Groups around the World, Second Edition. Boulder: ABC-CLIO, LLC, 2016. McIntyre, W. David. The Significance of the Commonwealth, 1965–9. New York: Macmillan, 1991. Mitchell, Nancy. Jimmy Carter in Africa: Race and the Cold War. Washington, DC: W.W. Center Press, 2016. Mohanty, Pramod Kumar and Aron Andemichael. “Colonialism and Land in Africa: A Case of Italian Land Policy in Eritrean Highlands.” Proceedings of the Indian History Congress, Vol. 71 (2010–2011): 950–958. https://www. jstor.org/stable/44147563. Motsamai, Dimpho and Mzukisi Qobo. “Regionalism in Africa: Development Crises and the Growing Influence of Emerging Powers, In Regions and Crises: New Challenges for Contemporary Regionalisms. Edited by Lorenzo Fioramonti. Cham: Palgrave Macmillan, 2012. Mshomba, Richard E. Economic Integration in Africa: The East African Community in Comparative Perspective. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2017. Nalule, Victoria R. Energy Poverty and Access Challenges in Sub-Saharan Africa: The role of regionalism. Cham: Palgrave Macmillan, 2019. The National Assembly, Republic of Kenya. Kenya National Assembly Official Record (Hansard) Jun 1 - Jul 30, 1965, Second Session (cont’d). Nairobi: Government Printer, 1965. Notholt, Stuart. Fields of Fire: An Atlas of Ethnic Conflict. London: Stuart Northolt Comm., 2008. Oboka, Wycliffe, Ephalina Maina and Atieno Odhiambo. History and Government Form 4, Nairobi: East African Educational Publishers, 2005. Okoth, Assa. A History of Africa: African nationalism and the de-colonisation process, Vol. 2. Nairobi: East African Educational Publishers, 2006.

5

NATION VS. CONTINENT: SOVEREIGNTY …

191

Orosz, Kenneth J. Religious Conflict and the Evolution of Language Policy in German and French Cameroon, 1885-1939. New York: Peter Lang, 2008. Pearce, Jeff. Prevail: The Inspiring Story of Ethiopia’s Victory over Mussolini’s Invasion, 1935–1941. New York: HarperCollins Publishers, 2014. Permanent Court of Arbitration. “Eritrea-Ethiopia Boundary Commission.” Cases. https://pca-cpa.org/en/cases/99/. Plaut, Martin. Understanding Eritrea: Inside Africa’s Most Repressive State. Oxford: Oxford, 2016. Salim, Salim Ahmed. “The OAU Role in Conflict Management.” In Peacemaking and Peacekeeping for the New Century. Edited by Olara A. Otunnu and Michael W. Doyle. Lanham: Rowman & Littlefield Publishers, Inc., 1998. Sani, Shehu. Hatred for Black People. Bloomington: Xlibris, 2013. Sesay, Amadu, Olusola Ojo and Orobola Fasehun. The OAU After Twenty Years. New York: Routledge, 2019. Shinn, David H. and Thomas P. Ofcansky. Historical Dictionary of Ethiopi. 2nd ed. Lanham: Scarecrow Press, Inc., 2013. Skaar, Elisabeth Stennes. Great Britain’s Policy on the Uganda-Tanzania War (1978–9): A Profound Lack of Confidence as a Major Power? MA History thesis. Trondheim: NTNU-Trondheim, 2015. Slocum, Steve. Why Do They Hate Us? Making Peace with the Muslim World. Vista: Top Reads, 2019. Stearns, Peter N., Michael Adas and Stuart B. Schwartz. World Civilizations: The Global Experience, Volume 2. New York: Harpercollins, 1996. St John, Ronald Bruce. Historical Dictionary of Libya. 5th ed. Lanham: Rowman & Littlefield, 2014. Thorndike, A. E. “Regionalism and the Commonwealth.” In Commonwealth in the 1980’s: Challenges and Opportunities. Edited by A.J.R. Groom and Paul Taylor. London: Macmillan Press, 1989. Touray, Omar A. The Gambia and the World: A History of the Foreign Policy of Africa’s Smallest State, 1965-1995. Hamburg: Institut fur Afrika-Kunde, 2000. Tronvoll, Kjetil and Daniel Rezene Mekonnen. African Garrison State: Human Rights and Political Development in Eritrea. Suffolk: James Currey, 2014. UNECA. “History of Africa’s Regional Integration Efforts.” (Web). United Nations Economic Commission for Africa. https://www.uneca.org/oria/ pages/history-africa%E2%80%99s-regional-integration-efforts. UNECA and African Union. “Assessing Regional Integration in Africa II: Rationalizing Regional Economic Communities.” Addis Ababa: Economic Commission for Africa, 2006. United Nations. “The Regional Economic Communities (RECs) of the African Union.” United Nations—Office of the Special Adviser on Africa (Web). November 1, 2019. https://www.un.org/en/africa/osaa/peace/recs.shtml.

192

S. M. MAGU

United Nations. Charter of the United Nations, Chapter I—Purposes and Principles. UN Charter, art. II, § 4, cl. 1. United States Congress/United States of America. Congressional Record: Proceedings and Debates of the 91st Congress, First Session, Volume 115–Part 2, January 22, 1969 to February 4, 1969 (p. 1381–2774). Washington, DC: United States Congress, 1969. Vestal, Theodore M. “Reflections on the Battle of Adwa and its Significance for Today,” In The Battle of Adwa: Reflections on Ethiopia’s Historic Victory Against European Colonialism. Edited by Paulos Milkias and Getachew Metaferia. New York: Algora Publishing, 2005. Le Vine, Victor T. Politics in Francophone Africa. Boulder: Lynne Rienner Publishers, 2004. Wall, Irwin M. France, the United States, and the Algerian War. Berkeley: UC Press, Ltd., 2001. Wallerstein, Immanuel. “The Role of the Organization of African Unity in Contemporary African Politics.” In Africa and international organization. Edited by Yassin El-Ayouty and Hugh C. Brooks. The Hague: Martinus Nijhoff Publishers, 1974. Welz, Martin. Integrating Africa: Decolonization’s Legacies, Sovereignty and the African Union. New York: Routledge, 2013. Whiteman, Kaye. “Mutual Perceptions in Africa,” In State and Society in Francophone Africa since Independence. Edited by Anthony Kirk-Greene and Daniel Bach. New York: St. Martin’s Press, 1995. Worrall, James. International Institutions of the Middle East: The GCC, Arab League, and Arab Maghreb Union. New York: Routledge, 2017. Yihun, Belete Belachew. “Ethiopian Foreign Policy and the Ogaden War: The Shift from ‘Containment’ to ‘Destabilization,’ 1977–1991.” In Politics and Violence in Eastern Africa: The Struggles of Emerging States. Edited by David Anderson and Øystein Rolandsen. London: Routledge, 2015.

CHAPTER 6

Made in Europe: Breaking Nations, Secession Movements and OAU Responses

Introduction After independence, nations soon found themselves in new, and some old feuds resurrected, now powered by European weapons, expertise and funding. Uti Possidetis juris would also test the stability of new nations, particularly with ethnic groups divided across international borders. The conflicts and secession movements were often ethnic, sometimes religious, but also both, such as in Biafra, Nigeria. Sudan’s conflict resumed in 1983 after imposition of Sharia law, killing ~ 2 million, displacing 4 million, while Sudan’s 2003 Darfur conflict led to 100,000 deaths and millions displaced. The Congo continues to grapple with Katanga’s secession, ethnic conflict, militias, foreign intervention and rebels destabilizing South Sudan, Uganda, Burundi and Rwanda. The new state had learnt well and applied the lessons of the colonial state to dealing with the new contest to state authority, notwithstanding the abuses suffered under colonialism.1

1 See Adam Hochschild, King Leopold’s Ghost: A Story of Greed, Terror, and Heroism in Colonial Africa (New York: Houghton Mifflin, 1998); Neal Ascherson, The King Incorporated: Leopold the Second and the Congo (London: Granta Books, 1999); Caroline Elkins, Britain’s Gulag: The Brutal End of Empire in Kenya (London: Penguin Random House, 2014); David Anderson, Histories of the Hanged: The Dirty War in Kenya and the End of Empire (New York: W. W. Norton & Co., 2005); and Susanne Kuss, German

© The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2021 S. M. Magu, Explaining Foreign Policy in Post-Colonial Africa, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-62930-4_6

193

194

S. M. MAGU

The crown of the impact of pre-colonial, now post-colonial conflicts based on ethnicity and colonial exacerbation of existing conflicts was seen in Rwanda’s 1994 genocide. The total death toll of almost 1 million over 100 days represented 7 people killed per minute. As the world collectively mourned inaction, the UN peacekeeping force’s withdrawal and failure to protect civilians, and rued American inability to impose rules despite its hegemony, the hitherto inviolable doctrine of absolute sovereignty and non-interference in the internal affairs of a state was getting a remake: it became a responsibility for the state to protect its people. Where a state was deemed unable or unwilling to do so, the principle of non-intervention ‘yield[ed] to the international responsibility to protect.’ Africa’s hitherto warlords running riot, and their state backers, suddenly found vastly diminished hiding places, with presidents being sought by the ICC. Although Rwanda changed international perceptions, and intervention in Libya occurred in 2011, it was not clear that Africa’s conflicts and secession were in the past.

A Different Beast: Secession Secession was not inevitable. But its likelihood was highly elevated, given historical ethnic and religious conflicts before the colonial state made its debut. Differences, grievances and conflicts in African countries reflected historical realities, patterns of authority, shared identities and religion. The coastal strip of Kenya/Somalia/Tanganyika/Mozambique predominantly Muslim (against the Christian/African religious areas) had seen control seesaw between various foreign and local powers (Portuguese and Omanis), but were incorporated into British/Italian/French/German colonies after 1885. Even with new arrangements, conflict ensued: Tanganyika, Zanzibar and Pemba have had ongoing conflicts and rumblings of secession, as was the case in Nigeria with the Republic of Biafra, Ethiopia’s separation from Eritrea, the Greater Somalia project and South Sudan breaking away from Sudan. Today, Kenya’s coast has secessionist rumbles; Zanzibar perennially aims to break up with Tanzania, while a low-intensity civil war has been going on in Cameroon between English-speaking and French-speaking regions.

Colonial Wars and the Context of Military Violence (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 2017).

6

MADE IN EUROPE: BREAKING NATIONS, SECESSION …

195

Secession in African countries started in the first decade of—for Congo, two weeks—after independence. Congo’s case was peculiar due to the vested interests of nearly every major power, given the natural resources it was had, including stuff that went boom. The need to control these resources and creation of an easily manipulated weak state benefitted the interests of the Great Powers. Western perception that Patrice Lumumba was leaning right even after initial attempts to seek help from the US to quell the rising secessionist tide presented opportunity for external interference. Besides the superpowers, European nations, recently dethroned of colonial possessions, aimed to continue playing a role. The French, losing territories right and left in a rapidly disintegrating empire and humiliations in Asia and Algeria, were active in the Great Lakes region. The British lost Kenya and failed to rein in Ian Smith in Rhodesia. In Congo, Belgium sought to control resources, mines and mining operations through the Anglo-Belgian mining conglomerate Union Minière du Haut-Katanga (UMHK), and support the Belgian community’s attempts to create permanent settlements, a la South Africa, Kenya Colony and Rhodesia. Secession first arises in ancient Rome’s struggle for “political military, and economic existence”; […] “the political act of secessio involved troops abandoning their camps and emigrating with the plebs from the city to an alternate area of occupation”2 ; it was a form non-participation in ‘community,’ “the plebeians’ withdrawal from military service.”3 Mackay concurs with this definition, beginning by articulating the settings whereupon the plebs, defined as the ‘full,’ ‘mob’ or ‘throng,’4 attempted “to end the political monopoly held by the patricians and to be allowed to hold offices granting imperium and the priesthoods of the state religion,”5 and the fourfold economic goals, including issues of debt and liability, famine (and its contribution to tyrannical rule), agitation around land distribution, limits on private ownership and distribution to the poor,

2 Lisa Marie Mignone, The Republican Aventine and Rome’s Social Order (Ann Arbor: UMich Press, 2016), 17. 3 Mignone, The Republican Aventine, 18. 4 Christopher S. Mackay, Ancient Rome: A Military and Political History (New York:

Cambridge, 2004). 5 Mackay, Ancient Rome: A Military and Political History, 2004, 33.

196

S. M. MAGU

and legal reform that included published codes on legal matters.6 Secession defined the actions in which “the plebs attempted to secure their aims against patrician intransigence through ‘secession.’ This means ‘withdrawal’ and signifies that the plebs would remove themselves in a body to a site outside of Rome, and refuse to act in their normal roles unless their wish was granted.”7 Three secessions are identified, in 494 BC, 450 BC and 287 BC. Dunstan writes that “this First Secession supposedly witnessed a large number of plebeians withdrawing from the city and occupying one or two of the hills overlooking the Tiber,”8 their action magnified by Rome’s enemies: “the seceding plebeians, [who] thus enjoyed sufficient leverage to wrest from the patrician senators the right to create their own functionaries.”9 Secession manifests following the fall of the Roman Empire. Del Mar points to the cessation of payment of homage by English princes to the Western Roman Empire, “governed, in the name of the Basileus, by a praetorian prefect, whose court was at Treves.”10 Not even Justinian’s consolidation of empire, taking the titles of ‘Alamannicus, Gothicus, Franciscus, Germanicus, Anticus, Alanicus, Vandalicus and Africanus,’11 could prevent this order from collapsing and heralding the next version of secession. After a period of anarchy, “Rome seceded from the Basileus and laid the foundation of the Medieval Empire. One of the first measures of the secession was the re-imposition of those taxes which formerly had been remitted to Constantinople. The secession took place in 726.”12 Secession is shown in the context of service provision (medical and legal) and higher education, by doctors, students or by both. Preventing secession entailed “making the suspected party swear that he would not

6 Mackay, Ancient Rome: A Military and Political History, 2004. 7 Mackay, Ancient Rome: A Military and Political History, 2004, 35. 8 William E. Dunstan, Ancient Rome (Lanham: Rowman & Littlefield Publishers, Inc.,

2011), 46. 9 Dunstan, Ancient Rome, 2011, 46. 10 Alexander Del Mar, The Middle Ages Revisited/The Roman Government and Religion

and Their Relations to Britain (New York: Cambridge Encyclopedia Co., 1900), 260. 11 Del Mar, The Middle Ages Revisited, 1900. 12 Del Mar, The Middle Ages Revisited, 260.

6

MADE IN EUROPE: BREAKING NATIONS, SECESSION …

197

commit the apprehended crime.”13 This was significant when cities were threatened with wholesale defections. “In 1204, after a secession of this kind to Vicenza, the City passed a Statute prohibiting citizens from following the seceding scholars or from aiding and abetting similar secessions in future.”14 Punishment included banishments, goods’ confiscation and preventative actions including Town-statutes that townspeople swore allegiance to. Elsewhere, the Cistercians (a Benedictine-based, Catholic religious order of monks and nuns) who “armed with the authority of church officials and with the backing of the duke of Burgundy, [they] sought a ‘desert place’, ‘a place of horror and of vast solitude.’”15 Some accounts consider the Avignon Papacy to be a ‘secession’ that led to “disorders of every kind, tumult and robbery prevail[ing] in the streets.”16 A religious connotation of secession includes, for example, Muhammad’s move from Mecca to Medina in 622; Fines calls it “the secession from Mecca.”17 In After 1648, the meaning of secession has generally revolved around splitting of (mostly) unitary states. For the US, “the term secession had been used as early as 1776,”18 stemming South Carolina’s objection to taxation based on total population (which possibly included enslaved persons) as opposed to the number of ‘free persons.’ South Carolina’s position on secession hinged on perceived northern aggressions; secession remained a useful negotiation tool and attempts to create a different state structure for slave-holding states. An 1851 attempt to secede did not succeed, but Governor William Gist, “looked upon secession as a measure calculated to secure permanent concessions to the south, or failing in this,

13 Hastings Rashdall, The Universities of Europe in the Middle Ages (Oxford: Clarendon

Press, 1895), 171. 14 Rashdall, The Universities of Europe, 171–172. 15 Janet E. Burton and Julie Kerr, The Cistercians in the Middle Ages (Woodbridge:

The Boydell Press, 2011), 12. 16 Henry Hallam, View of the State of Europe During the Middle Ages, 7th ed, vol. 1. (Paris: Baudry’s, 1840), 207. 17 John Fines, Who’s Who in the Middle Ages: From the Collapse of the Roman Empire to the Renaissance (New York: Barnes & Noble, Inc., 1995), 168. 18 Eric Foner and John A. Garraty, eds., The Reader’s Companion to American History (Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1991).

198

S. M. MAGU

as the first step towards a Southern Confederacy.”19 Even after the Civil War, talk of secession continued, e.g., in Texas. Today, succession entails the ‘removal from participation in a common body,’ commonly understood as the juridical state. Nowhere would secession attempts pervade more than Africa, given state formation, colonial schisms, rent-seeking, ethnic basis of government and lingering power distribution issues. Secession’s What, Where and How: Violence and Separatism as Political Strategy What counts as secession can be confounding; for instance, Fazal and Griffiths argue that “decolonization secessionism accounts for only 35 percent of the total number of secessionist movements since 1931,”20 although most scholars do not consider decolonization secession. Secession can occur as the “assertion of minority sectional interests against what was perceived to be a hostile or indifferent majority,”21 chiefly in states without mechanisms to address dissenting views. Secession can produce violence: “during the first secession, the plebs swore an oath they would kill anyone who harmed their elected representatives, the tribunes.”22 Secession can mirror, stem from or result in rebellion, where rival bodies form within a state. There are only a handful of countries that address secession; the US is one, with a proposed, orderly process: “no new State shall be formed by the junction of two or more States, or Parts of States without the Consent of the Legislatures of the States concerned as well as of the Congress.”23 Other countries afield do, with differing requirements. “St. Kitts and Nevis constitutionally guarantees a right of unilateral secession for one part of its territory, while France and Spain prohibit secession at the constitutional level, and India and Turkey prohibit not 19 Steven A. Channing, Crisis of Fear: Secession in South Carolina (New York: W. W. Norton & Co. 1974), 95. 20 Tanisha Fazal and Ryan Griffiths, “A State of One’s Own: The Rise of Secession Since World War II.” The Brown Journal of World Affairs, vol. 15, no. 1 (Fall/Winter, 2008), 203. 21 Foner and Garraty, The Reader’s Companion to American History, 972. 22 Christopher S. Mackay, Ancient Rome: A Military and Political History (New York:

Cambridge, 2004), 35. 23 Martin J. Alperen, Foundations of Homeland Security: Law and Policy (Hoboken: Wiley & Sons, 2017), 83.

6

MADE IN EUROPE: BREAKING NATIONS, SECESSION …

199

just secession, but secessionism, any democratic efforts toward changing the law.”24 Today, secession is alive and well around the world, including regions harkening to their pre-Westphalian unique characteristics and differences, such as Padania seceding from Rome.25 Despite widespread use, secession’s success rate has been dismal. “Only 16 percent of the contiguous secessionist movements eventually succeeded—i.e. won independence and established a sovereign state […] 77 percent of the movements related to decolonization succeeded.”26 If liberation activities leading to decolonization counted as secession, non-contiguous secessions would appear more successful. Likewise, the position that secession has regularly applied violence to accomplish its goals would be supported. In Africa, just as the state continues to borrow, even imitate the European juridical states that colonized them in structures, secession in Africa was more likely than not, given the structured nature of the differences resulting from divide-and-rule, highlighting communities’ differences, splitting the ire toward the colonial powers and refocusing it to other communities in the colony. A comparison of the contours of an ethnic map of Africa drawn against a political map of Africa illuminates the near-inevitability of secession. Although few states address secession, they have working mechanisms to petition government by conducting referenda on many issues, but consistently, on amending constitutions. Kenya’s 2010 constitution review restructured administrative units, abolishing provinces and districts in favor of ‘counties.’ In the case of referenda, more autonomy, rather than independence garner support; Quebecois did not support formation of an independent country.27 Some secession attempts see violence, but is not necessary for secession: “not only is most secessionist activity resolutely non-violent, but in addition, instances of separatist violence are

24 Jason Sorens, “Legal Regimes for Secession: Applying Moral Theory and Empirical Findings.” Public Affairs Quarterly, Vol. 28, No. 3 (July, 2014): 260. 25 Walter Pohl, “Memory, Identity and Power in Lombard Italy.” In Yitzhak Hen and Matthew Innes, Eds., The Uses of the Past in the Early Middle Ages (New York: Cambridge University Press, 2000). 26 Tanisha Fazal and Ryan Griffiths, “A State of One’s Own: The Rise of Secession since World War II.” The Brown Journal of World Affairs, vol. 15, no. 1 (Fall/Winter, 2008): 199–209. 27 Wayne Norman, “Domesticating Secession.” Nomos, vol. 45, Secession and SelfDetermination (2003): 193–237.

200

S. M. MAGU

statistically quite rare despite journalistic clichés that suggest the ubiquity of such violence […] and the two processes can be inversely proportional.”28 Secessions can be pacific, non-violent and constitutional—“in Singapore-Malaysia, although it took the Malaysian Parliament only three hours to do so, the constitutional amendment that eliminated Singapore from the federation was passed by the required two-thirds majority.”29 For Denmark and Iceland, future secession was built into the ‘Act of Union,’ and successfully completed during World War II, in 1944.30 Proponents of secession may prefer to stay unless irreconcilable differences, heightened animosities, or histories that make further conflict more likely exist. Negotiation may be preferred by the state under threat of secession as has been the case in Canada and Spain.31 20 years after the SPLM/SPLA took up arms, Sudan agreed to peace talks, which included the possibility of the secession of South Sudan, with significant revenue loss for the north. Consenting to peace talks was expedient since Bashir was “acting under duress: the national army was losing the war to the rebels, casualties were rising, and the war had grown unpopular in the north-all of which was exacerbating the country’s chronic economic problems.”32 Secession is also a preferred method of separation; in Yugoslavia’s breakup and ensuing conflict, splitting countries in a secession model was considered and promoted as a way to end the conflicts.33 Secession and violent conflict often have a positive correlation.34 Armitage holds that “violence has been secession’s most frequent 28 Siniša Maleševic and Niall Ó Dochartaigh, “Secession and Political Violence.” In Peter Radan, Ed., The Ashgate Research Companion to Secession (New York: Routledge, 2011), 227. 29 Robert A. Young, “How Do Peaceful Secessions Happen?” Canadian Journal of Political Science, vol. 27, no. 4 (1994): 787–788. 30 Young, “How Do Peaceful Secessions Happen?” 1994. 31 Vincent Anesi and Philippe De Donder, “Voting Under the Threat of Secession:

Accommodation Versus Repression.” Social Choice and Welfare, vol. 41, no. 2 (July, 2013): 241–261. 32 Andrew S. Natsios and Michael Abramowitz, “Sudan’s Secession Crisis: Can the

South Part From the North Without War?” Foreign Affairs, vol. 90, no. 1 (2011): 23. 33 Jaroslav Tir, “Keeping the Peace after Secession: Territorial Conflicts between Rump and Secessionist States.” The Journal of Conflict Resolution, vol. 49, no. 5 (October, 2005), 713–741. 34 Jason Sorens, “Legal Regimes for Secession: Applying Moral Theory and Empirical Findings.” Public Affairs Quarterly, vol. 28, no. 3 (July, 2014): 259–288.

6

MADE IN EUROPE: BREAKING NATIONS, SECESSION …

201

companion.”35 Some movements are “ideologically committed to the use of violence as the preferred and most effective instrument for attaining secession.”36 In Eritrea’s negotiation to dissociate from Ethiopia, prolonged conflict ultimately led to Eritrea’s independence and had Ethiopia not consented to Eritrea’s secession, the conflict would have only gotten worse.37 Kashmir’s case is also complex. The majority Muslim citizenry, ruled by a Hindu prince who sided with India towards independence, despite the geography, citizens’ religious and ethnic affiliation makes its resolution challenging. One wonders whether a pacific Kashmir settlement can only be arrived at if it secedes and forms a completely separate state.38 The threat of violence to quell secessions can signal to seceding group/s that the government will pursue all means necessary to sustain unity. In Yugoslavia’s breakup, “the Yugoslavian government has nonetheless claimed that it may use military force to ensure against secession.”39 Nigeria’s case supports the centrality of violence to secession, although ethnic conflict previously erupted between Hausas and Igbos in 1953.40 Despite conflict’s relationship to secession, both sides have incentive to maintain good relations: “both the host state and secessionists are bound by the principle: violent suppression of a secessionist movement is equally impermissible as the use of violence and lethal force in pursuit

35 David Armitage, “Secession and Civil War.” In Don Harrison Doyle, Ed., Secession as an International Phenomenon: From America’s Civil War to Contemporary Separatist Movements (Athens: The University of Georgia Press, 2010), 37. 36 Aleksandar Pavkovic and Peter Radan, Creating New States: Theory and Practice of Secession (New York: Routledge, 2016), 58. 37 Sandra F. Joireman, “Secession and its Aftermath: Eritrea.” In Ulrich Schneckener and Stefan Wolff, Eds., Managing and Settling Ethnic Conflicts: Perspectives on Successes and Failures in Europe, Africa and Asia (New York: Palgrave, 2004). 38 Neera Chandhoke, “When Is Secession Justified? The Context of Kashmir.” Economic

and Political Weekly, vol. 45, no. 46 (November 13–19, 2010), 59–66. 39 Cass Sunstein, “Constitutionalism and Secession.” The University of Chicago Law Review, vol. 58, no. 2 (1991): 643. 40 S. E. Orobator, “Nigeria: From Separatism to Secession 1950–1970.” Africa: Rivista trimestrale di studi e documentazione dell’Istituto italiano perl’Africa e l’Oriente, Anno 42, no. 2 (Giugno, 1987): 301–314.

202

S. M. MAGU

of secessionist aims.”41 States recognize that even parts of the polity that are seceding, some elements advocate for continued association with the mother country. This explains why few referenda produce unanimous results in favor of seceding. Despite the violence it produces, the potential for spillover of conflict into neighboring countries due to ethnic constitutions of countries and the overall undesirability of secession, Ahmed argues that “it was clear right from the beginning that secession was the only and inexorable outcome of the protracted civil wars of Eritrea and South Sudan”42 even though “secession of those two countries was opposed by the entire African continent.”43 Presently, Africa has 29 so-called active separatist movements, some of which predate the formation of the OAU, such as Katanga. Their methods vary (violent or non-violent), their reach is local, regional and external, and their impetus and support varies. Some movements sought to establish separate countries while others pursued a strategy less common: Somalis in the Kenya Northern Frontier District of Kenya wanted to reconfigure regional geography by joining the Greater Somalia project, declaring secession and waging war against Kenya’s government. The record is mixed, but mostly, unsuccessful. Kenya: Northern Frontier District (NFD) and Former Sultanates (Coast) If today’s (failed state of) Somalia presents a conundrum, its colonial history is equally complex. Somalia suffered the indignity of being divided up (and colonized) by three European powers with varying administrative systems. North-western Somaliland was French (French Somaliland, or today’s Djibouti), the Horn was British Somaliland and the rest Italian Somaliland. Somalia’s issues today are not just based in colonial history; yet, splitting up homogeneous communities between Europeans and countries didn’t help. After World War II, the Four Powers Commission comprising of the UK, US, France and Russia was convened to decide the fate of Italian colonies in Africa. The British favored unification of Somali 41 Aleksandar Pavkovic, “The Right to Secede: Do We Really Need It?” In Peter Radan and Aleksandar Pavkovic, Eds., The Ashgate Research Companion to Secession (Burlington: Ashgate, 2011): 451. 42 Dirdeiry Ahmed, Boundaries and Secession in Africa and International Law: Challenging Uti Possidetis (New York: Cambridge University Press, 2015), 2. 43 Ahmed, Boundaries and Secession in Africa, 2.

6

MADE IN EUROPE: BREAKING NATIONS, SECESSION …

203

territories; this was vetoed by American, French and Russian representatives.44 The USSR suspected the British of scheming to expand colonial possessions while Italy wanted a 30-year trusteeship, but got ten.45 In the north, the British utilized indirect rule, applying a “minimalist” approach to its administration. The nomadic lifestyle made it difficult to administer clans and communities without fixed abodes; therefore; the clan system was the primary administrative structure, while the religious differences between the British colonial administrators versus that of the majority of Somaliland subjects prevented significant cross-pollination of ideas, including of governance, education, and work and property ownership.46 Conditions in Italian Somaliland were different; there was greater investment in physical, social, economic and governance infra(structure)s. The region had inherited and developed an unusual governance culture. “The Italian administration relied much more heavily on bribery, enticements and patronage than the British did,”47 supported readily by widespread use of force, bureaucratic centralization, and economic and political patronage. This high level of hands-on involvement was “left southern Somalia with political, social, economic and physical structures that were not consistent with those in the north.”48 This difference procured a “formidable task of unifying the peoples of two territories who spoke similar dialects, yet held different political views and administrative systems. They also operated different education systems, and had separate currencies.”49 The British also dragged their feet, claiming to gradually prepare their colonies for future self-rule. There was no effort to close the gap and developing a unitary education system, government, military and basic administration was impossible. The differences challenged cohesion of the new independent state. The road to unification was lined with domestic and global geopolitical minefields. British Somaliland purposely created conditions meant to 44 Mohamed Diriye Abdullahi, Culture and Customs of Somalia (Westport, CT: Greenwood Press, 2001). 45 Abdullahi, Culture and Customs, 2001. 46 Rebecca Richards, Understanding Statebuilding: Traditional Governance and the

Modern State in the Modern State in Somaliland (New York: Routledge, 2014). 47 Richards, Understanding Statebuilding, 81. 48 Richards, Understanding Statebuilding, 81. 49 Susan M. Hassig and Zawiah Abdul Latif, Somalia (Tarrytown: Marshall Cavendish

Benchmark, 2008), 26.

204

S. M. MAGU

be unacceptable to the Italian Somaliland, but also dialectic slights and insults: The northerners flew to Mogadishu, the southern capital […] the southerners deliberated alone for a day about what their conditions would be for union in the north. Finally they summoned the northerners in the middle of the night and presented them with a set of options that all started with the word hal, a word which means ‘one’ in southern Somali dialect, but which meant a ‘she-camel’ in the northern dialect […] the president is one, and it is going to be ours, the prime minister is one, and it is going to be ours; the capital is one, and it is going to be ours; the currency is one, and it is going to be ours; the flag is one, and it is going to be ours.50

The goal of the harsh conditions was to ensure the north would reject unification. The north agreed, but later rejected the unification constitution, which the south rigged to engineer passage. “The south voted overwhelmingly for the constitution. In an effort to declare a massive yes vote, southerners not only reported a yes vote higher than the estimated population for their region, but also declared a small village called Wanla Weyn in the vicinity of Mogadishu to have registered a yes vote higher than the 100,000 ballots cast in the entire north.”51 Italy and Britain pulled all the stops to influence the direction of a unified Somalia, which was already grappling with the Ethiopia-Somalia border issue. Italy pursued good relations with both Ethiopia and Somalia, but was concerned a unified Somalia “might join the Commonwealth. This event, it was felt, would significantly reduce Italian influence in the country.”52 Italy suggested that “Italian diplomats had learned about London’s intention to promote the union between the Somaliland and Somalia with the hidden aim of inviting Somalia-Somaliland to join the Commonwealth,”53 a position favored by the US and the UK. Ethiopia supported the Italian position, fearing that if Somalia joined the Commonwealth, it would become a powerful state on its doorstep and thus have a better chance at slicing off Ogaden in any future conflict. Even 50 Abdullahi, Culture and Customs, 26–7. 51 Abdullahi, Culture and Customs, 27. 52 Paolo Tripodi, The Colonial Legacy in Somalia: Rome and Mogadishu: from Colonial

Administration to Operation Restore Hope (New York: St. Martin’s Press, 1999), 92. 53 Tripodi, The Colonial Legacy in Somalia, 92.

6

MADE IN EUROPE: BREAKING NATIONS, SECESSION …

205

France had its interests in the region: it wanted, and retained, control of Djibouti. Despite the challenging circumstances—within its borders, arising from its history and confronting geopolitical power plays, Somalia embarked on the journey to a modern state. Its first three years of independence cemented the political arrangements, while its conflict with (then-still) Kenya (colony) would not manifest until 1964. Even then, Somalis distributed across (present-day) four countries would draw in especially the British, but also serve to magnify the very difficult task of applying the principle of Uti possidetis juris to the borders of Somalia even as Somalis were scattered across several countries. Additionally, karmic injustices saw to it that Britain, which had controlled parts of Somalia and Kenya, had almost inadvertently ensured that conflict would recur, stemming from the borders drawn in Berlin almost a century before. Greater Somalia: Unification, Disunity and Secession During the annual OAU Summit in Cairo in 1964, members adopted Resolution AHG/Res. 16 (I) in 1964, or the ‘Cairo Resolution,’ whose premise functioned essentially in the tradition of Uti possidetis juris. It affirmed “that all Member States pledge themselves to respect the frontiers existing on their achievement of national independence.”54 Kenya was one of the newest members, bound by the OAU Charter to keep its colonial borders. This was problematic: the NFD district, carved out of Somaliland, was home to Kenyan Somalis who desired to join their kin in Somalia, as reflected by the result of a British survey on the future of the NFD region, preferably before Kenya’s independence. The British faced ardent nationalist fervor by Somalis who claimed being neglected by colonial authorities and did not expect significant change with liberation.55 Somalia was also engaged in shuttle diplomacy to ascertain NFD secession to join Somalia. Britain’s position on NFD secession was unenviable: the idea of selfdetermination informed by nationalism suggested that Somalis should decide what happened to those in the NFD, yet the Cairo Resolution 54 Martin Minogue and Judith Molloy, African Aims and Attitudes: Selected Documents (New York: Cambridge, 1974), 199. 55 Irving Kaplan, Milna Choumenkovitch, Barbara Marvin, James McLaughlin, Harold D. Nelson and Ernestine E. Rowland, Area Handbook for Somalia (Washington, DC: American University, 1969).

206

S. M. MAGU

precluded this. Despite evidence of a sizeable Somali population in the Kenya Colony, “the region in question was so large that it approximated between one third and one half of Kenya and to have changed the boundaries in such a way to give this portion to Somalia would have considerably reduced the size of Kenya. It was clear from the pronouncement of Kenya leaders that this measure was unacceptable.”56 Support for territorial transfer from Kenya to Somalia risked setting a precedent where regions that traditionally considered themselves homogeneous could secede even as African countries with similar ethnic compositions were gaining independence and keeping colonial borders. Further, there was another side to the NFD secession debate: scholars argued that some in Somalia did not support NFD secession. This relied on Somalia excluding itself from the future conflicts in Kenya under the pretext of unity. Support for NFD secession might invite a Trojan horse to the new republic and an increase in conflict in Somalia.57 A year after independence, Kenya was engaged in a shifta’ war with secessionist-minded Somalis. Questions linger, as to whether the shifta war could have been avoided. The shifta war was fought to achieve ‘selfdetermination.’ The previously alluded to 1962 referendum on whether Somalia should remain as part of Kenya or join Somalia upon liberation showed overwhelming support, “but authorities told those who voted for independence that they were welcome to leave Kenya for Somalia but that Kenya was not ready to surrender its territory.”58 A subsequent British-authored, NFD Commission report recommended, in 1962, that “the eastern half of the NFD should be formed into a separate region without prejudice to the question of secession,”59 but eventually, in the context of the discussion of Majimbo (‘regions’) that were favored by the smaller parties in Kenya. The Boundaries Commission recommended that the NFD became one of Kenya’s seven regions (provinces), which

56 Vincent B. Thompson, Kenya-Somalia Border Problem 1941–2014 (Lanham: University Press of America, 2015), 93. 57 Kaplan et al., Area Handbook for Somalia, 1969. 58 Anneli Botha, Terrorism in Kenya and Uganda: Radicalization from a Political

Socialization Perspective (Lanham: Lexington Books, 2017), 44. 59 Thompson, Conflict in the Horn of Africa, 2015, 84.

6

MADE IN EUROPE: BREAKING NATIONS, SECESSION …

207

consisted of Central, Coast, Nyanza, Rift Valley, Western, Eastern, North Eastern [and Nairobi, also the capital].60 Residents of the NFD region argued that based on the economic, sociocultural and religious dissimilarities with the rest of the country, the region ought to more closely align with Somalia. Regional political parties, including the Northern Province Peoples’ Progressive Party (supported by ethnic Somalis in Wajir, Mandera, Moyale and Garissa), the Northern Frontier Democratic Party (NFDP), Peoples’ National League (PNL) and the National Political Movement (NPM), also advocated for the secession positions. A select few groups were opposed to secession and these were driven by fear of domination by the more populous Somali community. They included the Northern Province United Association (NPUA), Galla Political Union (GPU), the Kenya African National Union (KANU-which ascended to power at independence) and the United Ogaden Somali Association (UOSA). At the national level, independence took into account the fears of smaller ethnic groups being dominated by more populous groups. KANU and Kenya African Democratic Union (KADU) agreed to independence under a federalist constitution. KANU kept its word only until independence was achieved. For smaller communities, abandoning the “Majimbo” constitution under which Kenya achieved ‘madaraka’ (internal self-rule) on June 1, 1963, in favor of a strong, centralized state, demonstrated that the Kenyan government would not countenance secession. Neither did Somalis have any expectation of the KANU government being a more inclusive regime than the British had been. During colonization, Somalis and more generally, other pastoral communities in the north, northeast and northwest argued they were generally neglected and the trend continued after independence. The pastoralist, nomadic lifestyle made establishment of ‘institutions of settled life’ such as schools more difficult. A lot of the schools in Kenya were also run by missionaries and in the majority Muslim north and northeast, this was not exactly feasible. Direct and indirect rule was more difficult owing to the community’s lifestyle, exacerbated by the nomadic life that made fixed structures of governance less attractive. There was an additional—and curious—reality: most British settlers to Kenya undertook farming activities. As such, communities that lived

60 Thompson, Conflict in the Horn of Africa, 2015.

208

S. M. MAGU

in economically viable areas such as the Central Highlands and the Rift valley saw direct interactions and heightened interest by the British. It followed then that African societies in these regions were at the forefront of leading the liberation struggles while Somalis were mostly excluded. As Botha points out, “during forums such as the Lancaster House conferences, many ethnicities were adequately represented except the Kenyan Somalis. Consequently, when Kenya attained independence in 1963, the Somali people in Kenya felt that they had been left out and were not part of the new government.”61 Where Somalis participated in framing the destiny of a future independent country, they were ‘othered.’ This perception, apathy even, stemmed from the neglect occasioned by British colonization, to the separate religion and ethnicity, the ‘trouble in Kenya a few years ago’ (the Mau Mau rebellion) and a cynical ‘if we were brothers we would have met long ago.’ There were also distinct references to illustrate that the NFD was different from Kenya. NFD leaders walked a tightrope, blaming the British for everything including underdevelopment they considered an ‘abdication of responsibility’ by the British colonialists. Future Kenyan leaders took issue with the idea that “the people of southern Kenya were of a different race,” that there existed an irreconcilable difference in customs and religion, the notion of ‘Pan-Somali policy,’ and even ‘cleaned-up’ comments of “people of NFD and those of Kenya [having] incompatible lifestyles, which were ultimately too dissimilar to be easily reconciled.”62 Prior to independence, sentiment grew, that majority African governments would retaliate against colonial officials, as well as racial incompatibility.63 The fear was also rooted in the harsh colonial rule that was in many cases, unrepentant and downright torturous. In Somalia, this served to heighten calls for and gave some legitimacy to secession. The perception of difference in the Somali and other marginalized areas persists. Today, residents of Mandera, Garissa and Wajir counties speak of “going to Kenya,” tacit recognition of the differences. The Kenyan government’s treatment of the region did nothing to dispel these sentiments. Some examples cited include a 25-year emergency decree stemming from

61 Botha, Terrorism in Kenya and Uganda, 44. 62 Keren Weitzberg, We Do Not Have Borders: Greater Somalia and the Predicaments of

Belonging in Kenya (Athens, OH: Ohio University Press, 2017), 115. 63 Thompson, Conflict in the Horn of Africa, 2015.

6

MADE IN EUROPE: BREAKING NATIONS, SECESSION …

209

the shifta war. The 1984 Wagalla Massacre stands as another example. The Kenyan government suspects that some Somalis may have received training to wage war against Kenya.64 Somalia’s collapse in 1990 and the rise of Al Shabaab, World Islamic Courts and similar groups give oxygen to this suspicion. Half-Hearted Wars, Interventionist Nations, Regional Mediation and OAU’s Responses Skirmishes between the pro-secession Somalis in the NFD with Mogadishu’s support, and the Kenya government commenced in 1964. Kenya labeled the protagonists shiftas (bandits); the word was also used to mean hooligans, armed groups of youth, bandits and robbers. For northeasterners, the term also was used in the meaning of ‘rebels,’ guerrillas’ and ‘freedom fighters.’65 The term shifta was seen as pejorative with the crude element of shifta campaigns being linked to traditional pastoralist activities such as ‘cattle raiding,’ ‘cattle rustling’ and even poaching. In its usage, the term “refers to all forms of violent conflict occurring in northern Kenya during the 1960s.”66 The conflict exhibited some of the global geopolitical rivalries, including weapons purchased from international groups, and recruitment of foreign fighters. The war assumed broader dimensions: the Kenyan government opposed secession while the Somali government was supportive of the Greater Somalia project67 and NFD’s secession.68

64 Kim Foulds, “The Somali Question: Protracted Conflict, National Narratives and Curricular Politics in Kenya.” In Denise Bentrovato, Karina V. Korostelina and Martina Schulze, Eds., History Can Bite: History Education in Divided and Postwar Societies (Göttingen: V & R unipress, 2016). 65 Negash also notes shifta was first used to describe Ethiopian patriots resisting Italian occupation between 1935 and 1941 and Sudanese actions south/west of Ethiopia. See Tekeste Negash, Eritrea and Ethiopia: The Federal Experience (New Brunswick, NJ: Transaction Publishers, 2005). Karadawi attributes the term shifta to Ethiopia, and to the Amharic verb “shaffata” (rebel or bandit): see Peter Woodward, Ed., Refugee Policy in Sudan 1967 –1984 (New York: Berghahn Books, 1999). 66 Hannah Whittaker, Insurgency and Counterinsurgency in Kenya: A Social History of the Shifta Conflict, C. 1963–1968 (Leiden: Brill, 2014), 22. 67 Godfrey Mwakikagile, Kenya: Identity of a Nation, (Pretoria: New Africa Press, 2007) 68 Klaus Juergen G. Torsten Schwinghammer, Warfare Since the Second World War

(New York: Routledge, 2017).

210

S. M. MAGU

The shifta war was brief, lasting from 1964 to 1967. It produced few casualties, from 2,00069 to 2,50070 to ‘the correct total was impossible to know.’ 71 The entire affair was often described less as war and more as borderline criminal activities such as ‘raids.’ Participants were often called ‘gangs,’ cementing the idea of an irregular and perhaps illegitimate conflict with single digit death tolls.72 As a war, it was a lowintensity guerilla war; its weapons mostly small arms and light weapons, not conventional weapons. Some of the weapons used by the shiftas were obtained from the USSR and the UAE. Dr. Njoroge Mungai, Kenya’s Minister for Defense, held that weapons were coming from ‘an African government,’ (Somalia), in turn supplied by the USSR, keeping newer weapons and distributing the older weapons to the shiftas.73 To contain the conflict, Kenya used tactics borrowed from the British strategy employed against the Mau Mau, declaring a state of emergency and detention without trial for up to 56 days. It curtailed movement, required passes, confiscated livestock and thus deprived Somalis of their livelihood. It employed ‘villagization,’ concentrating citizens in villages with restricted access enforced by the military.74 Still, the porous KenyaSomalia border and a sympathetic Somali government facilitated flows of weapons and fighters. Kenya also signed a defense pact with Ethiopia, producing an alliance Somalia could never hope to defeat.75 NFD secessionists were not well resourced and couldn’t wage a conventional war: the shiftas switched their methods to include “raiding villages, killing and

69 Kim Foulds, “The Somali Question: Protracted Conflict, National Narratives and Curricular Politics in Kenya.” In Denise Bentrovato, Karina V. Korostelina and Martina Schulze, Eds., History Can Bite: History Education in Divided and Postwar Societies (Göttingen: V & R unipress, 2016). 70 Kaplan et al., Area Handbook for Somalia, 1969 71 Republic of Kenya, Kenya National Assembly Official Record (Hansard) Apr 28–May

29, 1970 (Nairobi: GPO, 1970). 72 CIA, Daily Report, Foreign Radio Broadcasts, Issues 221–225 (Washington, DC: FBIS 1965). 73 Republic of Kenya, Kenya National Assembly Official Record (Hansard) Nov 1–Dec 22, 1966 (Nairobi: GPO, 1966). 74 Whittaker, Insurgency and Counterinsurgency, 2014. 75 John Howell, “An Analysis of Kenyan Foreign Policy.” Journal of Modern African

Studies, vol. 6, no. 1 (1968): 29–48.

6

MADE IN EUROPE: BREAKING NATIONS, SECESSION …

211

looting.”76 The nomadic lifestyle of Somalis and historic infrastructure underdevelopment meant that as the insurgency progressed, there were few targets other than army installations and police stations, which the militias mined.

OAU: Negotiating Lasting Peace The war’s end was influenced by internal, regional, continental and global events. The OAU expressed a modest goal of “mutual lowering of the level of hostile propaganda”77 especially due to incendiary rhetoric especially coming from (Radio) Mogadishu.78 Kenya urged for OAU involvement, since OAU’s principle of inviolability of borders supported Kenya’s position. Both countries broke off diplomatic relations and rejected Nyerere‘s diplomatic overtures.79 Kenya declared it would defend its sovereignty and territory; “the Government feels that the border problem touches so directly upon vital national interests that to even recognise that boundaries are negotiable would itself constitute a threat to the country’s integrity.”80 Internal affairs in Somalia helped end the conflict sooner: Somalia’s new president, Abdirashid Ali Shermarke and PM Mohamed Haji Ibrahim Egal, assumed office in 1967. “The new Somali government announced a policy of detente with its neighbors,”81 to respect territorial integrity for each other’s territory, and retain fidelity to the OAU and its ideals.82

76 Jeni Klugman, “Kenya: Economic Decline and Ethnic Politics.” In E. Wayne Nafziger, Frances Stewart and Raimo Väyrynen, Eds., War, Hunger, and Displacement: The Origins of Humanitarian Emergencies, Volume 2: Case Studies (New York: Oxford University Press, 2002), 302. 77 Kaplan, et al., Area Handbook for Somalia, 1969, 229. 78 Howell, “An Analysis of Kenyan Foreign Policy,” 1968. 79 Mukhtar, Historical Dictionary of Somalia, 2003. 80 Howell, “An Analysis of Kenyan Foreign Policy,” 41. 81 Mohamed Haji Mukhtar, Historical Dictionary of Somalia (Lanham: The Scarecrow

Press, Inc., 2003), 132. 82 Klugman, “Kenya: Economic Decline and Ethnic Politics,” 2002.

212

S. M. MAGU

Somalia ultimately “recognized that the shifta war was unwinnable and that Kenya was a desirable economic partner.”83 The final peace agreement, signed in Arusha in 1968, was concluded under Zambia’s Kenneth Kaunda, Tanzania’s Julius Nyerere and Uganda’s Milton Obote, giving air to the role of regional peacemaking. Kenya retained all its sovereign territory, reaffirming the principles of Uti possidetis juris.84 Besides the OAU’s efforts, Somalia “formally renounced its claim to the NFD-thereby formally ending the ‘Shifta War’ in 1967.”85 For now, the Greater Somalia project was on pause, although elsewhere, the Ogaden War would percolate ten years later, for almost the same reasons. Despite the end of the war, Kenya would be challenged by determining citizenship especially after 1990. Porous borders, familial relations made identifying who was Kenyan Somali, and who was Somali Somali (and refugee) impossible given that not all births were in hospitals or recorded. This did lead to NFD residents waiting for years to obtain IDs and passports,86 essentially the same discrimination and extra scrutiny and that stokes the sense of being outsiders in their own country.87 Another outcome was the proliferation of guns, used for self-defense, and killing wild pigs and baboons. The shifta war illuminated the challenges of colonialism, such as dispersal of Somalis across 4 countries. Colonialism’s legitimacy had been thoroughly debunked, but OAU’s first decision was resolving to retain those borders. But the shifta war produced other outcomes: regional intervention worked, mediation resolved some issues, partnerships at continental and global levels (OAU and AU) could resolve border issues, secession was less attractive than it promised, and peace was a worthy 83 Naomi Chazan, Robert A. Mortimer, John Ravenhill and Donald Rothchild, Politics and Society in Contemporary Africa, 2nd ed. (Boulder: Lynne Rienner Publishers, Inc., 1992). 84 Michael Chandler and Rohan Gunaratna, Countering Terrorism: Can We Meet the Threat of Global Violence? (London: Reaktion Books Ltd, 2007). 85 Ben Rawlence and Human Rights Watch, ‘Bring the Gun Or You’ll Die’: Torture, Rape, and Other Serious Human Rights Violations by Kenyan Security Forces in the Mandera Triangle (New York: Human Rights Watch, 2009), 13. 86 Republic of Kenya, The Kenya National Assembly Official Record (Hansard) Mar 21–May 12, 1972 (Nairobi: Government Printer, 1972). 87 Tabea Scharrer and Neil Carrier, “Introduction. Mobile Urbanity: Somali Presence in Urban East Africa.” In Neil Carrier and Tabea Scharrer, Eds., Mobile Urbanity: Somali Presence in Urban East Africa (New York: Berghahn, 2019).

6

MADE IN EUROPE: BREAKING NATIONS, SECESSION …

213

goal to pursue. There would be conflicts, but fewer attempts to secede. The next case, Biafra, was more violent, complicated and had a different outcome.

Nigeria: Ethnic Conflict and Biafra’s Secession The Biafra War, or Nigerian Civil War and the Republic of Biafra that was established in the process of, and as an outcome of secession, lasted slightly over two and a half years, starting in July 1967, and ending in 1970 1990 with 100,000 deaths. Biafra escalated rapidly to become a regional conflict and attracted global players (Egypt, Benin, France and the British). Between half a million to two million (civilian) Biafrans died from starvation and related causes. Republic of Biafra’s architect was the Eastern Region military governor, Chukwuemeka Odumegwu-Ojukwu, who carved out territory in the Igbo-settled southeast Nigeria; it lasted all of 2.5 years. Since independence in 1960, coup d’états had been commonplace, including one in January 1966 and July 1966. Some coup leaders reinvented themselves as civilian rulers. The causes of the Biafra war were complex, multifaceted and spanned decades, perhaps centuries, although the mere high number of ethnic groups did not make civil war inevitable.88 Divide-and-rule had worked in British colonial authorities’ favor but now in Nigeria (and Kenya, India and elsewhere), undoing the divide to focusing on the rule was difficult. Biafra’s secession serves as useful British piñata, except, that the British gave a nod to regionalism. “The constitution stipulated that there would be three large regions, which coincided with the locations of the three major ethnic groups. The result was to heighten the importance of ethnic and regional identities.”89 Nkwocha argues many issues, including tribal, ethnic strife, unequal distribution of resources, military and civil service suggested that Nigeria was a most unequal place, that real grievances and differences existed. Igbos, Biafra State’s primary population were more and better educated, and hardworking, dominated the upper military

88 Lasse Heerten, The Biafran War and Postcolonial Humanitarianism: Spectacles of Suffering (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2017). 89 April A. Gordon, Nigeria’s Diverse Peoples: A Reference Sourcebook (Santa Barbara: ABC-CLIO, 2003), 127.

214

S. M. MAGU

echelon and civil service positions and as a result, “became prosperous and thus became odious to the rest of the nation.”90 Igbos’ success was not attributable to collaborating with, or serving as agents oppression over Yoruba and Hausas for the British during colonialism. The war was both ethnic and religious, but also reflected pre-colonial conflicts between ethnic communities.91 Nwadike distils its ‘major’ causes down to three issues hardly worth a civil war; they included political parties based on ethnicity, education disparities across ethnic groups and Nigeria’s division into regions.92 Further, northern Nigeria was predominantly Muslim, while the south is Christian and animist. Nigeria wasn’t a unified entity until 1914.93 From 1914 onwards, what tied Nigerians together remained unaddressed—but it was decidedly not nationalism. The Biafran war began with coups d’états: the first, led by Maj. Nzeogwu, occurred early in 1966. He was replaced by Igbo Major Gen. Aguiyi-Ironsi who headed an ethnically diverse Supreme Military Council. In July, a counter-coup resulted in the deaths of many Igbo officers. Major Gen. Yakubu Gowon was appointed as the head of a predominantly northern government. In September and October 1966, riots in the north saw almost 50,000 easterners and southerners killed and most others forced to flee.94 Biafra’s secession raises questions of how much support it enjoyed, whether it carried out retaliatory atrocities such as targeting non-Igbos, or whether a unification policy that recognized the North’s marginal infrastructure and allowing differential treatment without antagonizing the rest of the country could have prevented the war. The government’s reaction to the declaration was as expected: it mobilized troops to retake the seceding (eastern) region

90 Onyema G. Nkwocha, The Republic of Biafra: Once Upon a Time in Nigeria: My Story of the Biafra-Nigerian Civil War—A Struggle for Survival (1967 –1970) (Bloomington: AuthorHouse, 2010), 22. 91 Jeremy Black, War and Its Causes (Lanham: Rowman & Littlefield, 2019). 92 Jerome Agu Nwadike, A Biafran Soldier’s Survival from the Jaws of Death:

Nigerian—Biafran Civil War (Bloomington: Xlibris, 2010). 93 Al Venter, Biafra’s War 1967 –1970: A Tribal Conflict in Nigeria That Left a Million Dead (Midlands: Helion, 2015). 94 Philip Jowett, Modern African Wars (5): The Nigerian-Biafran War 1967 –70 (Oxford: Osprey Publishing, 2016).

6

MADE IN EUROPE: BREAKING NATIONS, SECESSION …

215

and especially capture the ‘capital’ city of Enugu.95 Federal soldiers’ military objective to recapture Biafra; they ignored the rules of war, as they advanced upon rag-tag enemy groups that practiced aiming using sticks. The soldiers’ conduct had an additional effect: civilians fled as “Nigerian troops entered and comprehensively looted each of the towns.”96 The civil war produced many casualties and not just among combatants. In a region with historic food security challenges, both combat and non-combat related causes of death had an outsize effect on the conflict. Other consequences of the conflict, such as starvation due to food supply breakdowns, caused deaths in the hundreds each day during 1968 and 1969. Nigerian government’s position on Biafra was clear: it was vital to defeat Biafra: “if Biafra was allowed to secede, then a number of other ethnic nationalities within Nigeria would follow suit.”97 While this was plausible and becoming evident, a splinter state, the Republic of Benin, had been declared to the southwest of Nigeria, although it did not succeed or wage a protracted war. Some scholars consider its establishment as a ‘sympathetic state’—sympathetic with Biafra. For Nigeria, preventing these dominos from precipitating a snowball effect meant Nigeria had to confront—and win—in Biafra’s secession incident.

OAU and Africa’s Position on Biafra: A House Divided As the war intensified, a flurry of summits, meetings, indirect and direct diplomacy actions ensued, encompassing many actors: regional states, the OAU, the UK, the UN, several proximate and distant actors and even religious groups.98 While Nigeria considered Biafra a domestic issue, it also sought cover under the OAU’s principle of non-interference in the domestic affairs of member countries and inviolability of colonial

95 Alfred Obiora Uzokwe, Surviving in Biafra: The Story of the Nigerian Civil War: Over Two Million Died (New York: Writers Advantage, 2003). 96 Peter Baxter, Biafra: The Nigerian Civil War 1967 –1970 (West Midlands: Helion & Co. Ltd, 2014), 18–19. 97 Chinua Achebe, There was a Country: A Personal History of Biafra (New York: The Penguin Press, 2012), 96. 98 Thomas Princen, Intermediaries in International Conflict (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1992).

216

S. M. MAGU

borders.99 The UK’s involvement, although it adopted a neutral stance, was notable, given that it was party to, and in some instances, wholly responsible for decisions made during Nigeria’s colonialism and as independence approached. The OAU and the UN sought to end the conflict particularly during the 1967 Kinshasa Summit. The summit included “the passage of a resolution on the civil war, mandating a consultative mission to Nigeria.”100 Whether the OAU was an honest broker was questioned: it “harbored a strong One Nigeria from the very beginning of the war,”101 which was perceived as detrimental to prospects of a quick resolution, though perhaps the OAU’s position was to be expected. The OAU’s Kinshasa resolution on the Biafran War mirrored the Nigerian government’s; it called for an end to a conflict it considered an ‘internal affair.’ The OAU resolution skipped any mention of Biafra102 even as it applied pressure to limit states’ recognition of Biafra based on the retention of colonial-era boundaries.103 Ivory Coast’s Félix Houphouët-Boigny supported Biafra with resources and finances, his stance reflecting that of France, thus continuing his adversarial relationship with the OAU.104 Ivory Coast could potentially experience similar circumstances, but Houphouët-Boigny appeared unconcerned.105 The war’s persistence drove the OAU to a frantic search for a cease-fire and restoration of peace. During OAU’s 1969 Summit in Algeria, Nigeria stated its readiness to begin reconciliation talks with Biafrans if they abandoned pursuit of a separate state. Biafra countered that based on history, the only protection from massacres such as in 1967, Igbos’ path to merely existing was only assured by becoming an autonomous, country.106 Only 99 Olayiwola Abegunrin, Nigerian Foreign Policy Under Military Rule, 1966–1999 (Westport, CT: Praeger, 2003). 100 Heerten, The Biafran War, 2017, 72. 101 Achebe, There was a Country, 2012, 96. 102 Heerten, The Biafran War, 2014. 103 Achebe, There was a Country, 2012. 104 Stephen M. Saideman, The Ties That Divide: Ethnic Politics, Foreign Policy, and

International Conflict (New York: Columbia University Press, 2001). 105 In Ivory Coast, Houphouët-Boigny eliminated the likelihood of war, by ensuring ethnic balance in the different elements of government, including 50 percent parliamentarians who professed Catholicism, while the Christian population was about 10 percent. 106 Parker, “Biafra and the Nigerian Civil War,” 1969.

6

MADE IN EUROPE: BREAKING NATIONS, SECESSION …

217

half of the 42 OAU delegations attended this summit; 36 voted to reaffirm Nigeria’s territorial integrity, two abstained, while four voted against the resolution and were promptly labeled agents of imperialists and of neo-colonialism.107 Support for Biafra also came from France, reaching Biafrans through Gabon and Ivory Coast.108 Portugal also “permitted Biafra to buy arms and recruit mercenaries in Lisbon.”109 The USSR sent Biafra weapons and crews, especially fighter pilots including from Ethiopia, with USSR support.110 Biafra’s constraints mounted: major oil companies stopped payments for oil extracted from the region, depriving it of a source of wealth to prosecute the war. Conversely, the UK sold arms to the Nigerian government but in the UK, calls for the UK to dissociate itself from the Nigerian government’s troops’ atrocities were increasing. Most of the fighting ended early in 1970; the country could begin healing. The war may have never stood a chance of success, given difficulties obtaining weapons, training, support and killing of Italian oil workers, leading to loss of legitimacy, and internal conditions in Biafra. The OAU utilized strategies, groups and organs such as the Assembly, Council, General Secretariat, ad hoc Consultative Committee on Nigeria and heads of state to mediate the conflict.111 Notwithstanding most regard the OAU’s actions as woefully insufficient and had little impact on ending the war. The Ethiopian Emperor Haile Selassie was able to proclaim total reconciliation during the 1970 Summit.112 The Biafran War stemmed from historic issues magnified by colonialism, heralded conflicts with religious/ethnic/national flavor and regional powers became involved. Cold War rivalries also seeped into

107 Cynthia Kahn, “The O.A.U.: Hurrying Nowhere?” Africa Today, vol. 15, no. 5, (October–November, 1968): 1–2. 108 Abegunrin, Nigerian Foreign Policy, 2003. 109 M. Rafiqul Islam, “Secessionist Self-Determination: Some Lessons from Katanga,

Biafra and Bangladesh.” Journal of Peace Research, vol. 22, no. 3 (September, 1985): 216. 110 Franklin Parker, “Biafra and the Nigerian Civil War.” Negro History Bulletin, vol. 32, no. 8 (December, 1969): 7–11. 111 Gemuh E. Akuchu, “Peaceful Settlement of Disputes: Unsolved Problem for the OAU (A Case Study of the Nigeria-Biafra Conflict).” Africa Today, vol. 24, no. 4, Nigeria: Impact of the Oil Economy (October–December, 1977): 39–58. 112 Abegunrin, Nigerian Foreign Policy, 2003.

218

S. M. MAGU

the conflicts and resolution was not easy. Biafra imitated Katanga, Ogaden and the NFD, and exposed the challenges the OAU would encounter as members bickered, made half-hearted conflict resolution attempts, individual states bucked the OAU position and took sides, and regional rivalries were played out by proxy. Tanzania, Gabon, Ivory Coast, Zambia and Haiti supported, provided assistance and extended diplomatic recognition to Biafra. Biafra showed that post-colonial states were distributing economic resources, jobs and state functions selectively, often excluding some groups. Without a consensus of state functions or mechanisms to distribute resources equitably, the state would be captured by ethnic elites. The Biafran War did not attract broad support from western powers; still, rather than address the issues, pro-Biafran African states were painted as ‘agents of imperialism’ and violators of the OAU charter. Only two secessionist movements have succeeded in Africa: Ethiopia/Eritrea in 1993 and Sudan/South Sudan. Without western support, few, if any secessionist movements have succeeded, especially in Africa, although western support does not necessarily determine the likelihood of success of a secession movement.113 The question might always linger: Could the Biafran War have been avoided, since its genesis was the persecution, displacement and even indiscriminate killings of Igbos in the north, thus approximating genocide? If the federal government had considered its first duty to be the protection of its people, as the Responsibility to Protect (R2P) doctrine suggests, Nigeria might have gone in a completely different direction and not lost time, people and infrastructure to a needless, destructive and divisive war. bil¯ad as-s¯ ud¯an: Successful Secession and the Birth of South Sudan Sudan’s name originates from bil¯ ad as-s¯ ud¯ an, Arabic for the ‘land of the blacks.’114 Its history dates back to Kush and the earliest Nile River settlements. Before it split into two, Sudan was the largest country in Africa, almost 1 million mi2 . South Sudan’s secession had many precursors, including the regular British piñata malfeasance during colonialism 113 Raphael Chijioke Njoku, “The Ahiara Declaration and the Fate of Biafra in a Postcolonial/Bi-Polar World Order.” In Toyin Falola and Ogechukwu Ezekwem, Eds., Writing the Nigeria-Biafra War (Suffolk: James Currey, 2016). 114 Scopas S. Poggo, The First Sudanese Civil War: Africans, Arabs, and Israelis in the Southern Sudan, 1955–1972 (New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2011).

6

MADE IN EUROPE: BREAKING NATIONS, SECESSION …

219

and the ‘state’ it bequeathed to Sudan. The Second Sudanese War regularly makes the highlights reel; rarely does the first, despite running from 1955 through 1972 with a casualty count of ~ 500,000. The Second Sudanese War, which began in 1983 (some suggest 1985), was longer, more destructive, produced more casualties (2 million), led to 4 million IDPs and mostly refugees fleeing to Kenya, Uganda, Ethiopia and Congo. It concluded in 2005 with the Comprehensive Peace Agreement signed in Kenya, setting up a referendum, which would see the country split into Sudan and South Sudan. British colonial authority divided Sudan into two regions at the 10o N parallel; today, that roughly demarcates the Sudan/South Sudan border and importantly, racial/ethnic lines: below the 10o N parallel are less Arabic, more African agrarian and pastoral communities of the Nilotic group, including Dinka, Nuer, Shilluk, Burun and Anuak.115 Besides inter-communal conflict, Sudan’s wars pitted mostly the Arab north against the south, with the post-1956 independence igniting some of the worst conflict. The 1956 decision to unify and run the country as one immediately triggered q 17-year conflict from 1957: First Sudanese Civil War. The government was dominated by northern Arabs; religion, military and civil service. The future incompatibility in Kenya’s NFD was manifesting, in the case of Sudan, it was Nilotic groups versus northern Arabs. Since the oil was in the south, Sudan had an incentive to say united. While the First Sudanese Civil War is worthy of study, this section deals with the Second Sudanese Civil War, which started in 1983 and ended with the 2005 Comprehensive Peace Agreement (CPA) and the eventual independence of South Sudan. The war eventually pulled in different players: Sudan, Uganda and Libya were involved militarily; Egypt and the USSR supported the rebels side. Groups morphed and reinvented themselves, including the Sudan Defense Forces (mutinying soldiers, militias and bandits), ALF (Azania Liberation Front) supported by Israel (from 1969), Ethiopia, and Uganda (under Idi Amin, from 1971) and CongoBrazzaville.116 Sudan allied itself with and cooperated with Janjaweed (Arab Militias), former Rwandese Army (Hutu Interahamwe), South Sudan Defense Forces (SPLA offshoots), Ugandan rebel groups (Lord’s Resistance Army), Zaire (Mobutu, until 1997), Iraq and China. Libya

115 Poggo, The First Sudanese Civil War, 2011. 116 Poggo, The First Sudanese Civil War, 2011.

220

S. M. MAGU

and Congo provided military aid and combat troops late 1980s and early 1990s; Iran and Belarus provided non-combat aid. In opposition was the Sudanese Peoples’ Liberation Movement (SPLM), its military wing, Sudan Peoples’ Liberation Army (SPLA), other SPLA offshoots arose including the Anyanya (now, Anyanya II), while Ethiopia, Eritrea, Uganda and Israel became involved. During both the signing of the 1972 Addis Ababa agreement ending the first war and the during the 1983 resumption of the civil war, the Sudanese leader was Jaafar Nimeiry. Nimeiry progressively failed to honor the Addis Ababa agreement, causing rising instability in the late 1970s. As disillusionment with the unfulfilled promises from the 1972 Addis Ababa accords lingered, external factors played a role. Nimeiry had adopted a brand of “Arab socialism“ that frayed religious/ethnic-tribal interests and tax revenue collection was disrupted, sending the country’s debt out of control. Soon, the Breton Woods Institutions‘ conditionalities to lending such as ending government subsidies on basic foods led to anti-government protests, weakening Nimeiry’s government’s position. However, the resumption of the war stemmed from Sudan’s “Islamization,” explained by Nimeiry’s book, Why the Islamic Way? Sudan was 70% Muslim but Nimeiry’s institutionalization of ‘Islamic laws’ led to the use of “traditional Islamic legal punishments such as flogging for alcohol consumption, amputation for theft and death for apostasy”117 across Sudan, with new guidance issued weekly. The ‘September Laws’ or ‘shari’a laws’ replaced Sudan’s 1974 penal code; opposition to the code led to a state of emergency, and special courts designed to hand out ‘speedy justice’ as Sudan moved toward Islamization.118 Sudan’s reaction to the simmering, soon-to-be all-out rebellion was predictable; religious intolerance, coupled with the unfulfilled promises of the 1972 accord made a second civil war inevitable. Sudan declined to allow the disputed Abyei region to determine its future in a referendum, as stipulated in the 1972 accord.119 There were other reasons: revenue division, disputed control of special regions, exclusion from government, proposals to implement Sharia law, the status of political parties and 117 John L. Esposito, The Islamic Threat: Myth or Reality? 3rd ed. (New York: Oxford University Press, 1999), 85. 118 Abdel Salam Sidahmed and Alsir Sidahmed, Sudan (New York: Routledge, 2005). 119 Elke Grawert, “Introduction.” In Elke Grawert, Ed., After the Comprehensive Peace

Agreement in Sudan (Suffolk: James Surrey, 2010).

6

MADE IN EUROPE: BREAKING NATIONS, SECESSION …

221

ability to compete freely in democratic elections. “The successive Khartoum regimes […] have been notorious for encouraging enslavement of southern blacks, and increasingly Christian Sudanese […] the Arab cattle-herding tribes […] targeted in particular the Dinka […] accused of supporting the Sudan Peoples’ Liberation Army (SPLA).”120 The conflict then was dressed up as the SPLA fighting “partly to restore the old colonial borders and partly to protect the Dinka people as well as the environment,”121 but was also driven by the policies of the Arabdominated northern-Sudan based government, which saw little to no economic development in the south and the more non-Arab populated areas. Both civil wars in the south were devastating; during the Second Sudanese Civil War, many, severe outbreaks of famine and diseases increased the death toll. Both sides were intransigent, did not engage, and violated even the short-term cease-fires and agreements between the SPLM/SPLA rebels and their affiliates led by John Garang. Successive Sudanese governments under Nimeiry, al-Dahab, al-Mighrani and alBashir made the situation even more desperate, given weather changes that caused severe drought in southern Sudan and Ethiopia. As it controlled most of the transportation infrastructure, Sudan’s government declined to allow western aid distribution, terming it “meddling” by western powers. After George H. W. Bush’s inauguration, “Washington announced that it would begin delivering food to civilians in the south whether the government liked it or not.”122 It was the first time the UN (UNICEF), delivered food aid to both sides of a civil war. The end of the Cold War, preponderance of American power, war costs, intractability, length and severity of conflict and violence ultimately led to the 2005 Naivasha Accords.123

120 Jok Madut Jok, War and Slavery in Sudan (Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 2001), 1. 121 Jok, War and Slavery in Sudan, 2001, 23. 122 Deborah Scroggins, Emma’s War: A True Story (New York: Vintage Books, 2004),

128. 123 Jörg Gertel, Richard Rottenburg and Sandra Calkins, “Disrupting Territories: Commodification and Its Consequences.” In Jörg Gertel, Richard Rottenburg and Sandra Calkins, Eds., Disrupting Territories: Land, Commodification & Conflict in Sudan (Suffolk: James Currey, 2014).

222

S. M. MAGU

OAU and Sudan: Unable, Unwilling or Ineffective? Naivasha cemented its place in history in January of 2005: it witnessed the conclusion of the Comprehensive Peace Agreement (CPA) between the Sudan People’s Liberation Movement (SPLM/A) and the Government of Sudan (GOS). The CPA had been an extensive, 3-year process beginning with the July 2002 Machakos Protocol. The CPA ended the Second Sudanese Civil War, set out conditions for its implementation, set out parameters for north/south oil revenue sharing formula and a process to conduct an independence referendum within five years. In the January 2011 referendum (with a 98 percent turnout), the South Sudanese overwhelmingly voted for independence. In July 2011, South Sudan was formally admitted as the 193rd Member State of the United Nations.124 When the Second Sudanese Civil War started, the OAU undertook initiatives to resolve the conflict, including a proposal to organize a meeting between Sudan’s Prime Minister, Sadiq al-Mahdi and John Garang, the longtime SPLA/SPLM leader in 1987. Still, even though “various other cease-fires and peace talk initiatives for Sudan passed through the offices of the OAU,”125 it would become one of the most protracted, longest-running wars in Africa. There were regular meets: Sudan’s Prime Minister and Egypt’s leader (serving as OAU Chairman), frequently met with Garang. SPLM/SPLA was not just another rebel movement; it gained validation, but also showed OAU’s and IOs recognition of a country, manufactured in Europe. Sudan’s leadership changed in 1989; al-Bashir led a successful coup against Ahmed al-Mirghani. At his first OAU meeting, al-Bashir committed to reviving peace talks with the SPLM/A.126 Sudan recognized it could not just wish the South Sudan problem away, neither was it winning the war.

124 UN Mission in Sudan, “The Comprehensive Peace Agreement between the Government of the Republic of The Sudan and The Sudan People’s Liberation Movement/Sudan People’s Liberation Army,” United Nations Mission in Sudan. January, 2005. https://pea cemaker.un.org/node/1369. 125 Robert S. Kramer, Richard A. Lobban Jr. and Carolyn Fluehr-Lobban, Historical Dictionary of the Sudan, 4th ed. (Lanham: Scarecrow Press, 2013), 341. 126 Millard Burr and Robert Oakley Collins, Revolutionary Sudan: Hasan Al-Turabi and the Islamist State, 1989–2000 (Leiden: Brill, 2003).

6

MADE IN EUROPE: BREAKING NATIONS, SECESSION …

223

The OAU assigned neighboring countries the ‘heavy lifting’ tasks. One of the key figures in the peace overtures was Hosni Mubarak.127 IGADD (now: IGAD) offered mediation by presidents Moi (Kenya), Museveni (Uganda); afield, by Kaunda (Zambia) and Ethiopia’s vice president. Sudan even convened a ‘National Dialogue Conference on Peace Issues.’128 Libya and Egypt proposed a peace plan that did not address self-determination; Sudan eagerly embraced it, given it would not split the country.129 The South Sudanese, of course, were not amenable to any peace agreement that did not allow them to decide whether to be ruled by a predominantly Islamic north under Sharia law, but also recognized that a split would bring them economic wealth given that most oil was mostly located in the south. The peace process in Sudan showed the import of regional players: RECs such as IGADD, working with OAU support, could resolve regional conflicts. IGAD was later involved in Somalia, supporting the stabilization of the Transitional Federal Government (TFG). IGOs chimed in, often out of necessity, to deal with IDPs, refugees and to keep peace, hence UNDP, UNHCR and DPKO involvement.130 Secession, Breaking Apart, Old Conflicts, New States and Murky Futures: Conclusion The human experience is replete with conflict (~ 15,000 wars); conflict is often considered an extension of diplomacy, sometimes a prelude to peaceful settlements of disputes. The spectrum of possibilities for the conquered abide; yet holocausts such as, or the persistence of Sudanese civil wars point to outcomes necessitating consideration of whether being bound together, or seceding and forming new, independent states is more feasible. Africa’s conflicts occasioned by borders, religion, resources and even ethnicity markedly intensified especially due to colonialism—policies used to administer subjugated persons magnified existing differences. Borders draw in European capitals ignored the ethnic divisions of African 127 Burr and Collins, Revolutionary Sudan, 2003. 128 Burr and Collins, Revolutionary Sudan, 2003. 129 Hilde F. Johnson, Waging Peace in Sudan: The Inside Story of the Negotiations that

Ended Africa’s Longest Civil War (Brighton: Sussex Academic Press, 2011). 130 Katherine Almquist Knopf, Ending South Sudan’s Civil War (Washington, DC: Council on Foreign Relations, 2016).

224

S. M. MAGU

societies, the divisions procuring a more sustained ‘nationalism’ than the European-envisaged borders. Colonial tactics now became the tinder for the conflicts, attempts at secession and wholesale bloodletting. Elevating one group over the other was sure to cause resentment after independence, with weapons and other technologies made in Europe. Internal conflict existed, but colonialism intensified it and gave states templates for dealing with dissatisfaction. Sovereign nations, particularly in Africa, have rarely addressed the causes of conflict, and the Cairo Declaration to maintain borders may have missed an opportunity to negotiate new, acceptable borders. This may have been moot to begin with, for African countries attained independence to join an existing world with set processes for creating and recognizing new states, and while the UN issued proclamations urging decolonization, there was not substantive debate that included these societies to deliberate on the future of Africa. African leaders were aware that the distribution of some ethnic groups across sovereign borders, the creation of an oppressive European state, might give dissenters impetus to continue the resistance that had defined almost the three-quarters century in the twentieth century. History has witnessed swapping of populations—in India/Pakistan/Bangladesh, and with Israeli citizens,’ the right of abode. Should Africa have considered population swaps, for instance in Rwanda and Burundi, so that Hutus were in one country and Tutsis the other? And if not, were there reasonable grounds for secession, even though it has had a dismal success rate? Secession can be useful for signaling, bringing two sides to the negotiating table, as was the case in Sudan. Eritrea succeeded in separating from Ethiopia, with many casualties after a prolonged conflict across several decades. The record of secessionist failures, the sheer weight and complexity of logistics to run military campaigns and difficulty getting recognition has led to rebel groups to internal conflicts, aiming replace the then-ruling authorities rather than secede, even in the case of Rwanda during the genocide. The keepers of global peace including neighboring countries, African leaders, continental bodies and intergovernmental organizations such as IGAD(D), the O/AU and UN have regularly taken a leading role in ending conflicts, peacemaking and peacekeeping processes, finding consensus, monitoring implementation of accords and even on occasion, sanctioning one, both or all of the parties involved, pressuring them to cooperate. For Africa, the general view is one of an ineffectual O/AU,

6

MADE IN EUROPE: BREAKING NATIONS, SECESSION …

225

the record dismal on preventing conflict, concluding peace agreements, enforcing the peace treaties or long-term support to sustain the peace. Contending O/AU member positions and support of the rump state or secessionists drove wedges in organizations and among neighbors even as the principles of the OAU remained binding. Compared to the collective actions toward apartheid in South Africa and Ian Smith’s UDI, secession rarely stood a chance of succeeding. Eritrea and South Sudan are in a league of their own.

References Abdullahi, Mohamed Diriye. Culture and Customs of Somalia. Westport: Greenwood Press, 2001. Abegunrin, Olayiwola. Nigerian Foreign Policy Under Military Rule, 1966–1999. Westport: Praeger, 2003. Achebe, Chinua. There was a Country: A Personal History of Biafra. New York: Penguin Press, 2012. Akuchu, Gemuh E. “Peaceful Settlement of Disputes: Unsolved Problem for the OAU (A Case Study of the Nigeria-Biafra Conflict).” Africa Today, Vol. 24, No. 4 (October–December, 1977): 39–58. https://www.jstor.org/sta ble/4185729. Alperen, Martin. Foundations of Homeland Security: Law and Policy. Hoboken: Wiley & Sons, 2017. Ahmed, Dirdeiry M. Boundaries and Secession in Africa and International Law: Challenging Uti Possidetis. New York: Cambridge University Press, 2015. Anderson, David. Histories of the Hanged: The Dirty War in Kenya and the End of Empire. New York: W. W. Norton, 2005. Anesi, Vincent and Philippe De Donder. “Voting Under the Threat of Secession: Accommodation Versus Repression.” Social Choice and Welfare, Vol. 41, No. 2 (July, 2013): 241–261. https://www.jstor.org/stable/42001403. Armitage, David. “Secession and Civil War.” In Secession as an International Phenomenon: From America’s Civil War to Contemporary Separatist Movements. Edited by Don Harrison Doyle. Athens: University of Georgia Press, 2010. Ascherson, Neal. The King Incorporated: Leopold the Second and the Congo. London: Granta, 1999. Baxter, Peter. Biafra: The Nigerian Civil War 1967–1970. West Midlands: Helion & Co. Ltd, 2014. Black, Jeremy. War and Its Causes. Lanham: Rowman & Littlefield, 2019. Botha, Anneli. Terrorism in Kenya and Uganda: Radicalization from a Political Socialization Perspective. Lanham: Lexington Books, 2017.

226

S. M. MAGU

Burr, Millard and Robert Oakley Collins. Revolutionary Sudan: Hasan Al-Turabi and the Islamist State, 1989–2000. Leiden: Brill, 2003. Burton Janet E. and Julie Kerr. The Cistercians in the Middle Ages. Woodbridge: Boydell, 2011. Chandhoke, Neera. “When Is Secession Justified? The Context of Kashmir.” Economic and Political Weekly, Vol. 45, No. 46 (2010): 59–66. https://www. jstor.org/stable/25764126. Chandler, Michael and Rohan Gunaratna. Countering Terrorism: Can We Meet the Threat of Global Violence? London: Reaktion Books, 2007. Channing, Steven A. Crisis of Fear: Secession in South Carolina. New York: W. W. Norton, 1974. Chazan, Naomi, Robert A. Mortimer, John Ravenhill and Donald Rothchild. Politics and Society in Contemporary Africa. 2nd ed. Boulder: Lynne Rienner, 1992. CIA. Daily Report, Foreign Radio Broadcasts, Issues 221–225. Washington, DC: FBIS, 1965. Del Mar, Alexander. The Middle Ages Revisited/The Roman Government and Religion and Their Relations to Britain. New York: Cambridge Encyclopedia, 1900. Dunstan, William E. Ancient Rome. Lanham: Rowman & Littlefield Publishers, Inc., 2011. Elkins, Caroline. Britain’s Gulag: The Brutal End of Empire in Kenya. London: Random House, 2014. Esposito, John L. The Islamic Threat: Myth or Reality? 3rd ed. New York: Oxford University Press, 1999. Fazal, Tanisha and Ryan Griffiths. “A State of One’s Own: The Rise of Secession since World War II.” The Brown Journal of World Affairs, Vol. 15, No. 1 (2008): 199–209. https://www.jstor.org/stable/24590960. Fines, John. Who’s Who in the Middle Ages: From the Collapse of the Roman Empire to the Renaissance. New York: Barnes & Noble, 1995. Foner, Eric and John A. Garraty, eds. The Reader’s Companion to American History. Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1991. Foulds, Kim. “The Somali Question: Protracted Conflict, National Narratives and Curricular Politics in Kenya.” In History Can Bite: History Education in Divided and Postwar Societies. Edited by Denise Bentrovato, Karina Korostelina and Martina Schulze. Göttingen: V&R Unipress, 2016. Gertel, Jörg, Richard Rottenburg and Sandra Calkins. “Disrupting Territories: Commodification and Its Consequences.” In Disrupting Territories: Land, Commodification & Conflict in Sudan. Edited by Jörg Gertel, Richard Rottenburg and Sandra Calkins. Suffolk: James Currey, 2014. Gordon, April A. Nigeria’s Diverse Peoples: A Reference Sourcebook. Denver: ABCCLIO, 2003.

6

MADE IN EUROPE: BREAKING NATIONS, SECESSION …

227

Grawert, Elke. “Introduction.” In After the Comprehensive Peace Agreement in Sudan. Edited by Elke Grawert. Suffolk: James Surrey, 2010. Hallam, Henry. View of the State of Europe during the Middle Ages. 7th ed., Vol. 1. Paris: Baudry’s European Library, 1840. Hassig, Susan M. and Zawiah Abdul Latif. Somalia. Tarrytown: MCT Books, 2008. Heerten, Lasse. The Biafran War and Postcolonial Humanitarianism: Spectacles of Suffering. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2017. Hochschild, Adam. King Leopold’s Ghost: A Story of Greed, Terror, and Heroism in Colonial Africa. New York: Houghton Mifflin, 1998. Howell, John. “An Analysis of Kenyan Foreign Policy.” The Journal of Modern African Studies, Vol. 6, No. 1 (May, 1968): 29–48. https://www.jstor.org/ stable/158675. Islam, M. Rafiqul. “Secessionist Self-Determination: Some Lessons from Katanga, Biafra and Bangladesh.” Journal of Peace Research, Vol. 22, No. 3 (September, 1985): 211–221. https://www.jstor.org/stable/423621. Johnson, Hilde F. Waging Peace in Sudan: The Inside Story of the Negotiations that Ended Africa’s Longest Civil War. Brighton: Sussex Academic Press, 2011. Joireman, Sandra F. “Secession and its Aftermath: Eritrea.” In Managing and Settling Ethnic Conflicts: Perspectives on Successes and Failures in Europe, Africa and Asia. Edited by Ulrich Schneckener and Stefan Wolff. New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2004. Jok, Jok Madut. War and Slavery in Sudan. Philadelphia: UPenn Press, 2001. Jowett, Philip. Modern African Wars (5): The Nigerian-Biafran War 1967–70. Oxford: Osprey Publishing, 2016. Kahn, Cynthia. “The O.A.U.: Hurrying Nowhere?” Africa Today, Vol. 15, No. 5, New Trends in African Integration (October–November, 1968): 1–2. https://www.jstor.org/stable/4184947. Kaplan, Irving, Milna Choumenkovitch, Barbara Marvin, James McLaughlin, Harold D. Nelson and Ernestine E. Rowland. Area Handbook for Somalia. Washington: American University, 1969. Klugman, Jeni. “Kenya: Economic Decline and Ethnic Politics,” In War, Hunger, and Displacement: The Origins of Humanitarian Emergencies, Vol. 2: Case Studies. Edited by E. Wayne Nafziger, Frances Stewart and Raimo Väyrynen. New York: Oxford University Press, 2002. Knopf, Katherine Almquist. Ending South Sudan’s Civil War. Washington, DC: Council on Foreign Relations, 2016. Kramer, Robert S., Richard A. Lobban Jr. and Carolyn Fluehr-Lobban. Historical Dictionary of the Sudan. 4th Ed. Lanham: Scarecrow Press, 2013. Kuss, Susanne. German Colonial Wars and the Context of Military Violence. Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 2017.

228

S. M. MAGU

Lasley Trace and Clayton Thyne. “Secession, Legitimacy and the Use of Child Soldiers.” Conflict Management and Peace Science, Vol. 32, No. 3 (2015): 289–308. https://doi.org/10.1177/0738894214526541. Mackay, Christopher S. Ancient Rome: A Military and Political History. New York: Cambridge University Press, 2004. Maleševic, Siniša and Niall Ó Dochartaigh. “Secession and Political Violence.” In The Ashgate Research Companion to Secession. Edited by Peter Radan. New York: Routledge, 2011. Mignone, Lisa M. The Republican Aventine and Rome’s Social Order. Ann Arbor: UMich Press, 2016. Minogue, Martin and Judith Molloy, eds., African Aims and Attitudes: Selected Documents. New York: Cambridge University Press, 1974. Mukhtar, Mohamed Haji. Historical Dictionary of Somalia. Lanham: The Scarecrow Press, 2003. Mwakikagile, Godfrey. Kenya: Identity of a Nation. Pretoria: New Africa Press, 2007. Natsios, Andrew and Michael Abramowitz. “Sudan’s Secession Crisis: Can the South Part From the North Without War?” Foreign Affairs, Vol. 90, No. 1 (2011): 19–26. www.jstor.org/stable/25800378. Negash, Tekeste. Eritrea and Ethiopia: The Federal Experience. New Brunswick: Transaction, 2005. Njoku, Raphael Chijioke. “The Ahiara Declaration and the Fate of Biafra in a Postcolonial/Bi-Polar World Order.” In Writing the Nigeria-Biafra War. Edited by Toyin Falola and Ogechukwu Ezekwem. Suffolk: James Currey, 2016. Nkwocha, Onyema G. The Republic of Biafra: Once Upon a Time in Nigeria: My Story of the Biafra-Nigerian Civil War—A Struggle for Survival (1967–1970). Bloomington: AuthorHouse, 2010. Norman, Wayne. “Domesticating Secession,” Nomos, Vol. 45, Secession and SelfDetermination (2003): 193–237. https://www.jstor.org/stable/24220022. Nwadike, Jerome Agu. A Biafran Soldier’s Survival from the Jaws of Death: Nigerian–Biafran Civil War. Bloomington: Xlibris, 2010. Orobator, S. E. “Nigeria: From Separatism to Secession 1950–1970.” Africa: Rivista trimestrale di studi e documentazione dell’Istituto italiano perl’Africa e l’Oriente, Anno 42, No. 2 (Giugno, 1987): 301–314. https://www.jstor. org/stable/40760121. Parker, Franklin. “Biafra and the Nigerian Civil War.” Negro History Bulletin, Vol. 32, No. 8 (December, 1969): 7–11. https://www.jstor.org/stable/247 66444. Pavkovic, Aleksandar. “The Right to Secede: Do We Really Need It?” In The Ashgate Research Companion to Secession. Edited by Peter Radan and Aleksandar Pavkovic. Burlington: Ashgate, 2011.

6

MADE IN EUROPE: BREAKING NATIONS, SECESSION …

229

Pavkovic, Aleksandar and Peter Radan. Creating New States: Theory and Practice of Secession. New York: Routledge, 2016. Pohl, Walter. “Memory, Identity and Power in Lombard Italy.” In The Uses of the Past in the Early Middle Ages. Edited by Yitzhak Hen and Matthew Innes. New York: Cambridge, 2000. Poggo, Scopas S. The First Sudanese Civil War: Africans, Arabs, and Israelis in the Southern Sudan, 1955–1972. New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2009. Princen, Thomas. Intermediaries in International Conflict. Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1992. Rashdall, Hastings. The Universities of Europe in the Middle Ages: Salerno. Bologna. Paris. Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1895. Rawlence, Ben and HRW. ‘Bring the Gun Or You’ll Die’: Torture, Rape, and Other Serious Human Rights Violations by Kenyan Security Forces in the Mandera Triangle. New York: HRW, 2009. Republic of Kenya. Kenya National Assembly Official Record (Hansard) November 1– December 22, 1966. Nairobi: Government Printer, 1966. Republic of Kenya. Kenya National Assembly Official Record (Hansard) April 28–May 29, 1970. Nairobi: Government Printer, 1970. Republic of Kenya. The Kenya National Assembly Official Record (Hansard) March 21–May 12, 1972. Nairobi: Government Printer, 1972. Richards, Rebecca. Understanding State building: Traditional Governance and the Modern State in the Modern State in Somaliland. New York: Routledge, 2014. Saideman, Stephen M. The Ties That Divide: Ethnic Politics, Foreign Policy, and International Conflict. New York: Columbia University Press, 2001. Scharrer Tabea and Neil Carrier. “Introduction. Mobile Urbanity: Somali Presence in Urban East Africa.” In Mobile Urbanity: Somali Presence in Urban East Africa. Edited by Neil Carrier and Tabea Scharrer. New York: Berghahn, 2019. Schwinghammer, Klaus Juergen Gantzel Torsten. Warfare since the Second World War. New York: Routledge, 2017. Sidahmed, Abdel Salam and Alsir Sidahmed. Sudan. New York: Routledge, 2005. Scroggins, Deborah. Emma’s War: A True Story. New York: Vintage Books, 2004. Sorens, Jason. “Legal Regimes for Secession: Applying Moral Theory and Empirical Findings.” Public Affairs Quarterly, Vol. 28, No. 3 (2014): 259–288. https://www.jstor.org/stable/43574661. Sunstein, Cass R. “Constitutionalism and Secession.” The University of Chicago Law Review, Vol. 58, No. 2, Approaching Democracy: A New Legal Order for Eastern Europe (spring, 1991): 633–670. https://www.jstor.org/stable/ 1599969.

230

S. M. MAGU

Thompson, Vincent Bakpetu. Kenya-Somalia Border Problem 1941–2014. Lanham: UPA, 2015. Tir, Jaroslav. “Keeping the Peace after Secession: Territorial Conflicts Between Rump and Secessionist States,” The Journal of Conflict Resolution, Vol. 49, No. 5 (October, 2005): 713–741. https://www.jstor.org/stable/30045150. Tripodi, Paolo. The Colonial Legacy in Somalia: Rome and Mogadishu: from Colonial Administration to Operation Restore Hope. New York: St. Martin’s Press, 1999. Turner, Sharon. The History of England: From the Earliest period to the Death of Elizabeth, Vol. V. London: Longman, Orme, Brown, Green and Longmans, 1830. Uzokwe, Alfred Obiora. Surviving in Biafra: The Story of the Nigerian Civil War: Over Two Million Died. New York: Writers Advantage, 2003. Young, Robert A. “How Do Peaceful Secessions Happen?” Canadian Journal of Political Science, Vol. 27, No. 4 (December, 1994): 773–792. https://www. jstor.org/stable/3229106. Venter, Al J. Biafra’s War 1967–1970: A Tribal Conflict in Nigeria That Left a Million Dead. West Midlands: Helion Books, 2015. Whittaker, Hannah. Insurgency and Counterinsurgency in Kenya: A Social History of the Shifta Conflict, C. 1963–1968. Leiden: Brill, 2014. Weitzberg, Keren. We Do Not Have Borders: Greater Somalia and the Predicaments of Belonging in Kenya. Athens, OH: Ohio University Press, 2017. Woodward, Peter, ed. Refugee Policy in Sudan 1967–1984. New York: Berghahn Books, 1999.

CHAPTER 7

Region or Continent: O/AU Development and Regional Economic Communities

Introduction Shortly before midnight on Wednesday, December 11, 1963, Kisoi Munyao, soon-to-be Kenyan citizen and agile mountain, climber lowered the Union Jack and raised Kenya’s flag.1 As the sun rose majestic, a new day, new dawn, new era, was afoot. Kenya’s new ‘majimbo’—federal constitution—was promulgated. Here and in other European colonies, a century of ills that came with colonialism, divide-and-rule, and secondclass citizenship were ending. In Elechi Amadi’s words, after the day broke, new Kenyan citizens gathered in small towns, district HQs, provincial capitals and Enkare Nyirobi, the “place of cool waters,” to see Prime Minister, Kamau wa Ngengi, (Jomo Kenyatta) accept the instruments of government and address Kenyans and the world. Kenyatta identified four urgent issues: ugonjwa, umaskini, ufisadi and ujinga 2 (disease, poverty, corruption, ignorance and illiteracy). Life expectancy was 46.6 years (it was ~ 71 in Britain). British rule did little to 1 Alice Wairimu Nderitu, Kenya, Bridging Ethnic Divides: A Commissioner’s Experience on Cohesion and Integration (Nairobi: Mdahalo Bridging Divides, 2018). 2 Erick Wekesa, “Jomo Kenyatta’s Agenda Still Big Enough to Guide Us Today”, Daily Nation (February 23, 2018); see also: Clara Momanyi, “Miaka Hamsini ya Ujenzi wa Taswira ya Mwanamke Katika Ushairi wa Kiswahili Nchini Kenya.” In Inyani Simala, Leonard Chacha and Miriam Osore, Eds., Miaka Hamsini ya Kiswahili Nchini Kenya (Nairobi: Twaweza Communications, 2014).

© The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2021 S. M. Magu, Explaining Foreign Policy in Post-Colonial Africa, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-62930-4_7

231

232

S. M. MAGU

improve life expectancy, which today hovers near 70 (and 80 in Britain).3 In 68 years of British rule, Kenya made little, if any progress. Even as HDI indices improved, GNI per capita (ppp) grew anemically from US$100 in 1960 to US$872 today. Poverty headcount ratio at national poverty lines was 62, today it’s about 30. Percentage primary school enrollment was 62 in 1960, rising to 120 (1980) and settling at 103 today. Around Africa, colonialism’s impact was mixed, but generally, terrible for Africans. At independence, the Congo had meager human resources: “at the time of independence, there were less than two dozen Congolese who were university graduates.”4 Ironically, the report held that “under Belgian Government rule [after the Belgian Parliament wrestled the colony from King Leopold II in 1908], the Congo began to prosper economically and became the center of the greatest industrial concentration and the most extensive primary educational system in tropical Africa.”5 The report also noted that “although the claimed Congolese literacy rate was high by African standards, there was little secondary education for Black Africans in the Congo until 1954, except for seminarians.”6 It was also challenging to conceive of the likelihood of many university graduates given the substandard primary education, particularly when the report appears to imply that education beyond elementary levels was unnecessary.7 These challenges surpassed the Congo: forced labor and child labor, accompanied by insufficient educational infrastructure— schools, colleges, universities. India, with 240 million citizens in the 1850s, saw fewer than 3000 accepted into the civil service.8 Destruction of indigenous education systems magnified the challenges; as such,

3 The World Bank, “Life Expectancy at Birth, Total (years)—Kenya”, World Bank Data (May 12, 2020). https://data.worldbank.org/indicator/SP.DYN.LE00.IN?.locati ons=KE&display=graph. 4 US State Dept, The Department of State Bulletin, vol. 52, No. 1332, January 4, 1965 (DC: State Dept. 1965), 796. 5 State Department, The Department of State Bulletin, 1965. 6 State Department, The Department of State Bulletin, 1965, 796. 7 Gordon C. McDonald, Donald W. Bernier, Lyle E. Brenneman, Eileen M. Colligan,

Wayne A. Culp, Susan R. MacKnight and Michael L. Meissenburg, Area Handbook for the Democratic Republic of the Congo (Congo Kinshasa) (Washington, DC: U.S. Government Printing Office, 1971), 158. 8 David Northrup, Indentured Labor in the Age of Imperialism, 1834–1922 (Cambridge: Cambridge, 1995).

7

REGION OR CONTINENT: O/AU DEVELOPMENT …

233

education provided merely served the extractive, commercial goals of colonialism, thus the minimal training. Educating Africans ultimately became the purview of the church, which retained nefarious connections with settlers and colonial governments. Many future African leaders interacted with, learned from and were baptized by the missionaries; they also obtained sponsorship for higher education abroad. But in a historically Lutheran fashion, most educational activities were dedicated to spreading Christianity. “A typical mission station consisted of a school, a church, a hospital and residences of the missionaries”9 with the core mission being to facilitate reading the bible and conversion to Christianity. “Mission schools” continue to be critical players in education today. Education correlates with better welfare, wealth and health. As independence materialized, poverty persisted; economies remained agrarian, dependent on resource extraction and saw no diversification. Across Africa, adult literacy rate was 9 percent10 ; most tellingly, “ Congo enjoyed one of the highest literacy rates in Africa […] rural literacy was as low as 10 percent, but urban literacy rates were […] higher.”11 Many Africans would study in Europe and the US despite the barriers there too.

Made in Europe: Imposed Backwardness Shantha Bloemen’s journey in ‘Zambia’s T-Shirt Travels’ is fascinating, not only because of the opportunities (or downsides) of free trade, but also because of the death of manufacturing, the clear imposition of western economic theory on Africa, theories with no chance of success. In the T-Shirt Travels, partly shot in the former Northern Rhodesia, a narrator claims that ‘the hard work and ingenuity of the white (British) man had helped transform a continent defined by poverty, disease and lazy Africans;’ Christianity and missionary education might banish these conditions to the grave of a heathen past. The flipside to this modernity was taxation without representation, forced labor, gulags, involuntary confinement of families to deprive liberation movements of local support, 9 C. C. Wolhuter, “Education in Sub-Saharan Africa.” In Alexander W. Wiseman, Ed., Annual Review of Comparative and International Education 2018 (Bingley: Emerald, 2019), 229. 10 Wolhuter, “Education in Sub-Saharan Africa”, 2019. 11 McDonald, et al., Area Handbook for the Democratic Republic of the Congo, 158.

234

S. M. MAGU

divide-and-rule that persisted long after the pseudo-independence, and the expropriation of land once considered by Europeans terra nullius , all evidence of their occupation and robust social systems notwithstanding. Colonialism was costly: in its administration and impact on African traditional systems, institutions even populations. How much Europeans—not trading companies—knew of their countries’ colonial actions was unclear: after the 1857 Sepoy Mutiny that saw Sepoys “blown from a gun” the British assumed full colonial control in India.12 The indignant Alexandrina Victoria, Queen of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland and future Empress of India, decreed that the UK would hence no longer impose their beliefs on others. But HM the Queen was busy elsewhere: post-1885 Berlin Conference convened by the ‘Iron Chancellor,’ she bequeathed Mt. Kilimanjaro to her grandson, Friedrich Wilhelm Viktor Albert (Wilhelm II). But all around, colonial powers’ record of human rights subservient to commerce was atrocious; among the Belgians, Germans, Italians and the Portuguese, perhaps more than any other group. One of the world’s most egregious colonizers, Belgium, finally (in 2002) apologized for “complicity of some Belgian officers in the murder of the first president […] Patrice Lumumba,”13 and for the Rwanda genocide. There was no apology for “the criminal colonial regime in early twentieth-century Congo.” Estimates suggest “10 million Congolese died ‘during the Leopold period and its immediate aftermath [including] a group of about thirty children of seven or eight years, waiting their turn to receive twenty-five lashes from the whip,”14 a punishment that would render an adult unconscious, or the Congolese women who “were often taken as hostages, raped or turned into prostitutes,”15 or the example of “one Belgian officer [who] kept a gallows in the front of his station and lined his flower bed with human heads.”16 Calls to address such crimes against humanity are strident; reparations and restitution run into “no

12 Peter von Sivers, Charles A. Desnoyers and George B. Stow, Patterns of World History (New York: Oxford University Press, 2017). 13 Rhoda E. Howard-Hassmann, and Anthony P. Lombardo, Reparations to Africa, (Philadelphia: UPenn 2018), 103. 14 Howard-Hassmann and Lombardo, Reparations to Africa, 102. 15 Howard-Hassmann and Lombardo, Reparations to Africa, 102. 16 Howard-Hassmann and Lombardo, Reparations to Africa, 103.

7

REGION OR CONTINENT: O/AU DEVELOPMENT …

235

one knows the actual numbers killed, and there was no extermination order [although] the crime did occur within the historic memory of the grandchildren and great grandchildren of the victims.”17 This, despite the atrocities occurring during the longest reigning Belgian king, Léopold Louis Philippe Marie Victor (King Leopold II), from whom the current monarch, Philippe Léopold Louis Marie descends. Granted, there was some conflation of personal and public, including use of European soldiers in colonies—yet Belgium argues that it “is not legally responsible for his [Leopold II’s] actions.” North and east, the Nile waters treaties of 1902 and 1929 continue to haunt the nations at the source of the Nile. There are doubts over whether colonialism shifted resources from Africa: “colonialism was not sufficient to cause western development [but] colonialism did assist that development.”18 But even the apologists concede that poll tax and hut taxes drove forced labor from Indonesia to the Kenya Colony. Others argue that European development owed nothing to Africa, that colonies did not even ‘break even,’ and colonial powers should be thanked for bringing civilization, God, decrease in communal violence and slavery, and access to elements of ‘modernity’: education, jobs, government, new traditions, medicine and the like. No one can credibly claim that pre-colonial African societies did not have challenges; yet colonialism often exacerbated them and imported new problems, such as property ownership. In many countries, three socioeconomic, racial and political classes emerged; Asians (Indians) often found their way into the colonies, business and second-class citizenship. At independence they had built thriving communities, but were also seen as collaborators and benefitting off Africans’ misery. In Uganda, a decade after independence, Amin expelled Asians, while in the early 2000s Zimbabwe, Mugabe repossessed illegally appropriated land. The dispossessed Europeans had the presence to demand US$9 billion compensation, respect for the ‘rule of law’ and individual property rights. Tellingly, despite the veracity of the property ownership debacle and wealth gaps here and in South Africa, the dispossessed Europeans found support in the west, despite the admission of the evils of colonialism, and Nhemachena’s most interesting argument;

17 Howard-Hassmann and Lombardo, Reparations to Africa, 103. 18 Howard-Hassmann and Lombardo, Reparations to Africa, 104.

236

S. M. MAGU

For colonialists to claim that they developed African land is to effectively claim that colonisation was good for Africans and that the indigenous people must pay for supposed developments emanating from being colonised. This is more like a rapist who claims that the victim benefitted from the rape and therefore she must pay compensation to the rapist.19

In the 75-year post-colonial period, questions of land ownership and recompence linger. Colonial injustices remain unaddressed, genocides overlooked and the folly of haphazard states persists. European trepidation at independence was palpable; new majority African rule might avenge, a la Haiti. The feared retribution did not occur. Colonialism produced some minimal benefits. Ethnic conflicts fanned by colonialism persist, irreconcilable with modern statehood. European domination extended to post-Colonial institutions, e.g., World Bank and IMF. After colonialism ran Africa into the ground, western nations now controlled major global economic and trade structures. After imposing backwardness and strife, Africa was blamed and ‘shown’ to be unable to govern itself. OAU, IGOs and Economic Development in the Early Years Economic development is both necessary and costly for any state. It requires developing human resources, a healthy workforce, infrastructure and related structures of production. However, “at independence, many African countries inherited huge amounts of foreign debt contracted by colonial administrations.”20 The price for the end of colonialism was shouldering significant future development burdens, being saddled with the kind of albatrosses that would literally bankrupt it. The twin challenges of OPEC’s 1973 oil embargo and devastation of commodity prices left Africa with bills, and no funding sources. Borrowing from the 19 Artwell Nhemachena, “Anticipating African Economic Futures—Or Is It Time to Look in the Rear-View Mirrors? Land Restitution, Unemployment and the Figure of the Posthuman.” In Tapiwa Victor Warikandwa, Artwell Nhemachena, Nkosinothando Mpofu and Howard Chitimira, Eds., Grid-Locked African Economic Sovereignty: Decolonising the Neo-Imperial Socio-Economic and Legal Force-Fields in the 21st Century (Bamenda: Langaa RPCIG, 2019), 71. 20 Adebayo Adedeji, Towards a Dynamic African Economy: Selected Speeches and Lectures, 1975–1986 (Foreword by Abdou Diouf and Kenneth David Kaunda) (Totowa: Frank Cass, 1989), 551.

7

REGION OR CONTINENT: O/AU DEVELOPMENT …

237

Bretton Woods Institutions was conditioned on economic programs such as the Structural Adjustment Programs and the Washington Consensus. Borrowing from partners and aid providers was predicated on specific programs, and insurmountable debts continued western control.21 Africa soon found that independence was a paper tiger: with little understanding of the colonial conditions and levels of poverty necessitating government investments in social services, global bureaucrats and graduates of western education bought into free trade and liberalized markets; economic development theories that overlooked 75 years’ history permeated. Africans desired their own solutions: their collective desires, especially with development, were reflected in the OAU Charter; Article and 2 of its preamble recognized Africa’s dire economic position. The charter proposed ‘harness[ing] natural and human resources’ so as to ‘achieve a better life for the peoples of Africa’ (1b) and harmonizing policies in areas, such as ‘economic cooperation’ (2b)22 and by establishing the Department of Economic Affairs,23 signaled economic development as a primary goal. OAU’s efforts did not always succeed; Congo’s 1963 and 2013 per capita GDP was almost the same (US$377) despite the intervening 50 years growth, foreign aid, extraction and sale of minerals. Granted, Mobutu Sese Seko allegedly stashed nearly US$30 billion in Switzerland. The 1963 OAU Summit meeting reached consensus on resolutions on ‘Areas of Co-Operation and Economic Problems.’ A preparatory economic committee appointed to research common external tariffs, protection of emerging industries, stabilization of raw materials and commodity prices, restructuring global trade, floating national currencies, a Pan-African monetary zone, harmonization of country development plans and approval of the World Conference on Trade’s focus on issues of international trade. The OAU faced several regional issues including the role and expansion of residual colonial-era regional organizations.

21 Festus Eribo, “African Development and Innovation of Communication Technologies.” In Charles Okigbo and Festus Eribo, Eds., Development and Communication in Africa (Lanham: Rowman & Littlefield Publishers, Inc., 2004). 22 African Union, “OAU Charter”, https://au.int/sites/default/files/treaties/7759file-oau_charter_1963.pdf. 23 Owodunni Teriba, “Regional and Subregional Perspectives.” In Adebayo Adedeji, Patrick Bugembe and Owodunni Teriba, Eds., The Challenge of African Economic Recovery and Development (New York: Routledge, 2013).

238

S. M. MAGU

For example, the French West Africa community used the French CFA franc, created in 1945, as common currency. After independence, its use continued even as CFA membership split into two.24 Parallel to OAU’s formation, new ideas on economic development through RECs were coming online, and the 1960s was saw many initial RECs formed. They differed: some had official start dates, charters, administrative structures and secretariats, funding mechanisms and physical spaces. Nations with ideological, historical and experiential histories and sympathies convened, including the Non-Aligned Movement.25 The Non-Aligned Movement “was neither officially established, nor, much like the G7 (much smaller in terms of membership), does it have a founding charter or official statutes.”26 It had no permanent secretariat until 1994. Nehru, Tito and Nasser expounded on the purpose of non-alignment “as active neutrality which did not keep quiet and passive in international politics, but strove to interfere and serve as mediators in the service of the UN Charter.”27 NAM held meetings infrequently but saw a steady increase in membership from 47 attendees of its first, official 1964 meeting in Cairo to 53 in its Lusaka meeting, the final tally rising to 120 members and 17 observer countries.28 The second was the Group of 77 (or G77). It comprised of 77 nations considered part of the Third World. Of the founding 77 members, 33 (or 42 percent) were African nations. The G77 first convened on the sidelines of the first meeting of the United Nations Conference on Trade and Development, (UNCTAD). G77 was described as “a means for developing countries to promote their collective economic interests, to enhance their joint negotiating capacity on all major economic issues within the UN system, and to encourage economic and technical cooperation between these states.”29 UNCTAD and G77 were intricately 24 Teriba, “Regional and Subregional Perspectives”, 2013. 25 Jürgen Dinkel, The Non-Aligned Movement : Genesis, Organization and Politics

(1927 –1992) (Leiden: Brill, 2019). 26 Dinkel, The Non-Aligned Movement , 4. 27 Nataša Miškovi´c, “Introduction.” In Nataša Miškovi´c, Harald Fischer-Tiné and Nada

Boskovska, Eds., The Non-Aligned Movement and the Cold War: Delhi—Bandung— Belgrade (New York: Routledge, 2014), 7. 28 Dinkel, The Non-Aligned Movement , 2019. 29 Jan Wouters, Cedric Ryngaert, Tom Ruys and Geert De Baere, International Law:

A European Perspective (New York: Hart, 2018).

7

REGION OR CONTINENT: O/AU DEVELOPMENT …

239

connected; “the history of the Group of 77 (G77) is so intimately bound up with the history of [UNCTAD] that it his hardly possible to narrate the history of the one without also narrating the history of the other.”30 UNCTAD is considered the actualization of G77’s economic goals; its agenda was closely linked with OAU efforts.31 The G77, now expanded to 135 members, regularly tasked the Nigerian and South African presidents to re/present the G77’s concerns at the G7/G8 meetings.32 The New International Economic Order (NIEO) was founded in 1974 and was structured around the UN (NIEO membership closely tracked the G77). During the 1973 OPEC oil crisis, the OAU launched the Declaration on Cooperation, Development and Economic Independence; it was a precursor to the UN’s Sixth Special Session in Algiers in 1974 which launched NIEO.33 NIEO aimed for an “institutional framework that enables different nations of the world to work and grow together cooperatively; to achieve their maximum potentialities in economic objectives like development, trade, employment, eradication of poverty etc.; [an effort expressing] their demand for restructuring of international economic setup to reduce global inequality.”34 NIEO challenged an insular global system built on core-periphery dynamics. It sought to change domination of global political economy by the north, fostering “the acquisition of and development of a new set of answers for dealing with the new economic, political, social and cultural situations.”35 30 John Toye, “Assessing the G77: 50 Years After UNCTAD and 40 Years After the NIEO.” In Thomas G Weiss and Adriana Ethal Abdenur, Eds., Emerging Powers and the UN: What Kind of Development Partnership? (New York: Routledge, 2016), 11. 31 Chinedum Igbokwe, History Maker: The Sule Lamido Regime, Radical Populism, and Governance in Jigawa State, vol. 2 (Bloomington: Xlibris, 2017). 32 Monica Juma, Ed., Compendium of Key Documents Relating to Peace and Security in Africa (Pretoria: Pretoria University Law Press, 2006). 33 Guy Arnold, Ed., Guide to African Political and Economic Development (London: Fitzroy Dearborn Publishers, 2001). 34 P. S. Narayan Prasad, “The Long and Arduous Road Towards a New International Economic Order.” In K. C. Reddy, M. Jagdeswara Rao and S. Chandrasekhar, Eds., The New International Economic Order Perspectives: The NIEO Perspectives (Towards a Global Concern) (New Delhi: Ashish, 1991), 7. 35 Mircea Malitza and Ana Maria Sandi, “The NIEO and the Learning Processes of Society.” In Jorge Lozoya and Haydee Birgin, Eds., Social and Cultural Issues of the New International Economic Order (New York: Pergamon, 1991), 45.

240

S. M. MAGU

The fourth group was the Africa, Caribbean and Pacific States (ACP), founded in 1975. Beginning April 2020, after revision and adoption of the 2020 Georgetown Agreement, it became the Organisation of African, Caribbean and Pacific States (OACPS). Its headquarters are in Brussels, Belgium, though none of its 48 sub-Saharan Africa, 16 Caribbean and 15 Pacific states are in Europe—although the ACP-EU trade cooperation and the EU’s HQ points to a potential explanation. ACP’s secretariat was convened 3 years after its founding. The charter, structures, agreements and protocols, all binding, were quickly and successively drafted, voted upon and entered into force. It was evident that African states would continue trading with Europe, sentiment captured by Yakubu Gowon “We must of necessity trade with Europe and the rest of the world. But we also want the world to know that it is fiction to speak of a free trade area between developed and developing countries.”36 Guyana’s Foreign Minister, speaking during the first ad hoc meeting in Lagos in July 1973, concurred. Nonetheless, if ACP-EU was part of global free trade requiring reciprocity envisioned by GATT, there were doubts. The Guyanese Foreign Minister rejected “the idea that ‘the talks should proceed on the concept of a free trade area.’”37 The apprehension was reasonable: economic conditions in the Caribbean and Pacific mirrored Africa’s. Still, formal negotiations to establish the ACP took place in Brussels in October 1973 and Wenike Briggs, Nigeria’s Trade Minister was appointed spokesman. The Lomé Convention (Lomé I) was signed in Lomé, the capital of Togo, in 1975. It was a binding ‘partnership,’ rather than the less favorable ‘association.’ The convention was “proclaimed as politically neutral, which permitted it to be opened up to Marxist countries such as Ethiopia, Angola, and Mozambique, as well as liberal capitalist economies like Cote d’Ivoire and Kenya.”38 It gave the appearance of equality between ‘partners.’

36 Kaye Whiteman, “A History of the ACP-EU Relationship: The Origins and Spirit of Lomé.” In Annita Montoute and Kudrat Virk, Eds., The ACP Group and the EU Development Partnership: Beyond the North-South Debate (New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2017), 38. 37 Whiteman, “A History of the ACP-EU Relationship”, 38. 38 Whiteman, “A History of the ACP-EU Relationship”, 40.

7

REGION OR CONTINENT: O/AU DEVELOPMENT …

241

Membership in these institutions produced the occasional overlap in jurisdictions and terms. There were ambiguous terms and definitions, cross-purposes and complications. For example, the prohibition on dumping hazardous waste in, or accepting it from African countries to other African countries as a result of progressive Lomé Conventions meant that “Kenya (ACP) must prohibit waste imports from Egypt (non-ACP), what (sic) would contradict the OAU Bamako Convention permitting intra-African TMHW [Transboundary Movements of Hazardous Wastes].”39 ACP-EU was plagued by “serious attempts to undermine its coherence from the European side”40 that included “a Franco-Belgian military intervention”41 as a result of the so-called Shaba affair in Katanga. Even economic interdependence couldn’t get in the way of European neo-colonialism. The OAU and the African Economic Community Efforts to achieve African continental economic cooperation greatly interested the Casablanca group. Now, in the 1970s and 1980s, the issue was revisited. In 1991 in Abuja, OAU members signed the Abuja Treaty establishing the African Economic Community (AEC).42 AEC was the result of global trends toward regional economic blocs, e.g., EAC, SACU, ECCAS and ECOWAS. The OAU had a “long-term plan to create a panAfrican common market,”43 with anticipated net positive effects on trade, industrialization and economic integration. There were questions about benefits of trade, especially since most African economies were agrarian or services, such as tourism. This made the prospect of trade with Europe more useful than intra-African trade. The 1980s were trying times; the economic shock from OPEC’s control of oil production, Structural Adjustment Program (SAPs) that 39 Barbara Kwiatkowska and Alfred H. A. Soons, “Transboundary Movements of Hazardous Wastes and Their Disposal: Emerging Global and Regional Regulation.” In A. C. Kiss Lammers, Ed., Hague Yearbook of International Law/Annuaire De LA Haye De Droit International, vol. 5 (Dordrecht: Martinus Nijhoff Publishers, 1992), 113. 40 Whiteman, “A History of the ACP-EU Relationship”, 40. 41 Whiteman, “A History of the ACP-EU Relationship”, 40. 42 Guy Arnold, Ed., Guide to African Political and Economic Development (London:

Fitzroy Dearborn Publishers, 2001). 43 David MacKenzie, A World Beyond Borders: An Introduction to the History of International Organizations (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, Inc., 2010), 96.

242

S. M. MAGU

drastically cut aid, and natural calamities—drought and hunger were widespread particularly due to the effects of El Niño and La Niña led to major reductions in government spending. Globally, the convergence of geopolitical changes showed the need for a more effective OAU. Besides OPEC’s ‘imperium,’44 US and UK leadership (Ronald Reagan and UK’s Margaret Thatcher) saw government as the problem and did everything to shrink it, favoring market-driven economies, reduction in social welfare spending and government divesting itself of entrepreneurship. Soon, Bretton Woods Institutions adopted demands for market liberalization and free trade. African countries found themselves unable to borrow or procure aid. Structural Adjustment Programs and the Washington Consensus became the bane of most African countries. These changes provided impetus for the OAU to re-imagine itself, its purpose. The journey to the AU (actualized by the Sirte Declaration, 2002) was long, winding and preceded by the AEC, (May 1994, Abuja Treaty Establishing the African Economic Community) adopted in June 1991.45 This capped off a 10-year desire to focus on economics and transform the OAU into the AU.46 The AU’s goal was “accelerating the continent’s socio-political and economic development. Hence, the theme […] being ‘Peace, Development and Prosperity: The African Century.”47 The AU intended to see the African continent “play[s] its proper role in the global economic and international negotiations.”48 It was cognizant of slow progress, mounting challenges to economic growth, persistence of poverty, deleterious effects of misuse of foreign aid and loans by such lenders as the IMF, World Bank and the so-called Paris Club of Donors.

44 Karen Merill, “Oil.” In Akiya Iriye and Pierre-Yves Saunier, Eds., The Palgrave Dictionary of Transnational History: From the mid-19th century to the present day (New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2009). 45 Diana E. Kawenda, Legal reception and regional economic integration in Southern Africa (Hamburg: Anchor, 2017). 46 Alan Matthews, Regional Integration and Food Security in Developing Countries (Rome: FAO, 2003). 47 Kwamina Panford, “The Transition from the Organization of African Unity to the African Union.” In Kwadwo Konadu-Agyemang and Martin Kwamina Panford, Eds., Africa’s Development in the Twenty-first Century: Pertinent Socio-economic and Development Issues (Burlington: Ashgate, 2006), 69. 48 Steven C. Roach, Martin Griffiths and Terry O’Callaghan, International Relations: The Key Concepts (New York: Routledge, 2014), 4.

7

REGION OR CONTINENT: O/AU DEVELOPMENT …

243

There was growing recognition of increasing restlessness as elites accrued more wealth, poverty increased and wealth gaps rose. The OAU and AU address(ed) the continent’s foreign (external) debt; its impact on Africa and underdevelopment is more impactful than perhaps any other issue. The advocacy is loud: NEPAD has made it a key issue and recurs at O/AUs Ministerial and summit meetings. “Africa is unable to point to any significant growth rate or satisfactory index of general well-being”49 in part due to its other obligations, primarily debt. African countries will likely never repay the debts and even addressing it usurps inordinate resources. Direct debt forgiveness lobbying efforts have targeted different stakeholders “ranging from the UN to the IMF, World Bank,”50 and the ‘Cairo Agenda for Action.’ The lack of progress during colonialism leads to suspicion that Europe and the west might root for failure to justify the ‘challenges’ they experienced. Some countries do defy ‘expected outcomes’: in Cape Verde, “more was achieved in half a dozen years of independence than in four centuries of colonial rule.”51 Botswana is another example of Africa’s success story. OAU and the UN: Commissions, Funds and Cooperation The UN has been Africa’s key economic development partner through principal organs, programs, regional activities and targeted actions. The UN Economic and Social Council (ECOSOC) has been focused on Africa’s economic development. Although the UN’s goal was to ‘end the scourge of war,’ Global South nations oriented the UN toward tackling economic growth and poverty issues. By 1950, India’s population was ~400 million and China’s ~500 million. Both were considered Third World Countries (TWC). Afield, Africa’s population was ~200 million. That a principal UN organ (ECOSOC) was dedicated to economic development was forward-thinking; in April 1958, ECOSOC’s Resolution 671A (XXV) was adopted, establishing the Economic Commission for Africa (UNECA). UNECA owed its existence to advocacy by Africa’s independent countries: Ethiopia, Ghana, Liberia, Libya, Morocco, Sudan, 49 Crawford Young, The African Colonial State in Comparative Perspective (New Haven, CT: Yale, 1994), 4. 50 Vijay S. Makhan, Economic Recovery in Africa: The Paradox of Financial Flows (New York: Palgrave, 2002), 211. 51 Basil Davidson, Modern Africa: A Social and Political History, 3rd ed. (New York: Routledge, 1983), 238.

244

S. M. MAGU

Tunisia and the UAR and ironically, the UK. Resolution 671A (XXV) articulated UNECA’s goals as, to “participate in measures for facilitating concerted action for economic development in Africa,” study economic and technical issues, sharing results and advisory functions.52 UNECA would collaborate with supportive bodies and functions, limit membership to continental Africa, Madagascar and African islands. On account of their “territorial responsibilities in Africa,”53 Belgium, France, Italy, Portugal, Spain and the UK were included. UNECA admitted ‘associate members’ without voting privileges; they included Gambia, the Federation of Nigeria, Kenya, Zanzibar, Sierra Leone, (Italian-controlled) Somaliland, Tanganyika and Uganda. UN Specialized Agencies representatives and observers could also attend meetings without voting privileges. UNECA liaised with NGOs, adopted rules and procedures could conduct periodic self-evaluations, determine meeting frequency, annual reporting, headquarters (Ethiopia) and the (5) and location of sub-regional offices. Its Executive was appointed by the UN Secretary General, and financing was from the UN Budget. UNECA continues to focus on economic and social development, fostering intraregional integration and promoting cooperation for Africa’s development.54 All 54 sovereign African nations are members. In 1963, it secured a ‘permanent cooperation’ agreement with the OAU, facilitated by U Thant, then UN Sec. Gen. UNECA’s Addis Ababa location meant AU ministerial and summit meetings could coordinate together with the ADB, increasing prospects for cooperation.55 The 1971 ECA Conference of Ministers’ 1st meeting produced ‘Africa’s Strategy for Development in the 1970s.’ The OAU, ECA and ADB later convened the ‘African Ministerial Conference of

52 ECOSOC, United Nations Economic Commission for Africa (1958–10). TOR of the Economic Commission for Africa: resolution 671 A (XXV) adopted by the Economic and Social Council at its 1017th Meeting held on 29th April 1958 and amended by the council at its twenty sixth session. Addis Ababa. UNECA. http://hdl.handle.net/10855/ 16002. 53 United Nations, “Economic and Social Council; United Nations. Economic Commission for Africa (1958–10)”, 3. 54 United Nations, “Overview,” United Nations Commission for Africa. https://www. uneca.org/pages/overview. 55 Rita Kiki Edozie and Keith Gottschalk, The African Union’s Africa: New Pan-African Initiatives in Global Governance (East Lansing: Michigan State University Press, 2014).

7

REGION OR CONTINENT: O/AU DEVELOPMENT …

245

Trade, Development and Monetary Problems56 resulting in the ‘Addis Ababa Declaration of 1973.’ Today, UNECA focuses on two ‘pillars’: ‘promoting regional integration in support of the African Union and its priorities,’ and ‘meeting Africa’s special needs and emerging global challenges.’ It focuses on five thematic areas: regional integration, trade and infrastructure development, meeting the MDGs/SDGs, poverty reduction, growth, sustainable development and gender equity, good governance and participation, ICT, Science and Technology, evidencebased science, evaluation, monitoring, statistics and statistical development, while utilizing member states’ capacities, partnerships, technical assistance, communication and the sharing of best practices.57 It also supports ‘sub-regional activities,’ primarily through Africa’s eight RECs: AMU, SADC, COMESA, EAC, IGAD, ECOWAS, CEMAC, ECCAS and UEMOA.58 OAU and the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) UNDP is one of the most consequential UN agencies working in 177 countries today. It emerged from an unusual advocate; in 1949, Harry Truman proposed a ‘Point Four‘ agenda for a global assistance program to ensure, jointly and separately through the UN, the provision of “technical assistance for economic development.”59 Truman asked Congress in 1949 to authorize “an expanded programme of technical assistance for such [underdeveloped areas of the world] and an experimental programme for encouraging the outflow of private investment beneficial to their economic development.”60 Following talks including with the Organization of American States (OAS), “in 1950, at the initiative of the United States, the UN General Assembly established the Expanded Program of Technical Assistance (EPTA) to supplement and

56 Teriba, “Regional and Subregional Perspectives”, 2004. 57 UNECA, “About ECA—Overview of the ECA.” http://www.uneca.org/about_eca/

overview_of_eca.htm. 58 UNECA, “About ECA”, n.d. 59 Digambar Bhouraskar, United Nations Development Aid: A Study in History and

Politics (Delhi: AF Inc., 2007), 41. 60 (Bhouraskar, “United Nations Development Aid”, 2007, 41.

246

S. M. MAGU

expand the work of the growing number of agencies focused on development.”61 Funding came from the US (~60%) and voluntary member states’ contributions. EPTA was present everywhere: it gave food assistance in Palestine, Europe and other countries. UN agencies stepped in; for example, FAO pursued food security in Palestine.62 However UN agencies, “which are identified as being of a technical assistance in nature,”63 e.g., the ILO, UNESCO, WHO and IAEA, saw a lot of duplication. In 1949 and through the 1950s, establishment of a UN fund for economic development gained increasing support. Given global polarization, it would provide the resources needed by developing countries with no strings attached, work independently and withstand influence and manipulation. One proposal was a Special United Nation Fund for Economic Development (SUNFED). Developed countries were opposed, considering it duplication of World Bank’s work.64 SUNFED would “provide resources for nonliquidating projects that could not meet World Bank loan criteria.”65 As proposed, SUNFED would be a “large scale UN capital aid fund,”66 offering developing countries control and use of procured resources.67 Western countries were unconvinced of SUNFED’s necessity. In 1957, the US Senate was advised that “the Special United Nations Fund is parallel in every respect with the United Nations program

61 Robert F. Gorman, “United Nations Development Program.” In Thomas M. Leonard, Ed., Encyclopedia of the Developing World, Volume 1, A-E Index (New York: Routledge, 2006), 1606. 62 Amy L. S. Staples, The Birth of Development: How the World Bank, Food and Agriculture Organization, and World Health Organization Changed the World, 1945–1965 (Kent, OH: The Kent State University, 2006). 63 US Department of State, Intelligence Report, Issue 8228 (March 22, 1960) (Washington, DC: DOS-BIR, 1960), 7. 64 Francis Adams, The United Nations in Latin America: Aiding Development (New York: Routledge, 2010). 65 Stephen D. Krasner, Structural Conflict: The Third World Against Global Liberalism (Berkeley: UC Press, 1985), 185. 66 Johan Kaufmann, The Diplomacy of International Relations: Selected Writings (Hague: Kluwer, 1998), 103. 67 Krasner, Structural Conflict, 1985.

7

REGION OR CONTINENT: O/AU DEVELOPMENT …

247

of technical assistance”68 ; the US position thus objected to the formation of SUNFED.69 The United Nations Special Fund (UNSF, 1959)70 was the compromise outcome. It was authorized by UNGA’s Resolution 1240(XIII).71 UNSF had modest ambition and funding priorities, limited to “training, research and the formulation of national development plans.”72 UNSF also did not administer funds—this was channeled through other UN agencies, an outcome far from what SUNFED supporters envisioned. US opposition to SUNFED was overt and its vow not to contribute to the fund put SUNFED’s viability in question.73 Outside these power plays, Africa’s efforts to illuminate the urgency of development got a boost: three years later, UNSF and EPTA merged. In November 1965, the UN Development Programme (UNDP), under the UN’s Economic and Social Council (ECOSOC), was born.74 Since its 1965 inception, the UNDP has grown in size and scope. It has five Regional Bureaux: Latin America & Caribbean, Arab States, Asia Pacific, Europe and CIS and Africa. Predictably, the Africa Bureau is headquartered in Addis Ababa, alongside the UN Office for SouthSouth Cooperation. The UNDP became—and continues to be—critical in promoting sustainable development, eradicate poverty, reduce inequalities, foster inclusion, and develop capacity, policies and partnerships.75 Successes include increasing life expectancy and literacy rates (43% to 60% in 1985), increased income, halving child mortality rates and continues the pursuit of broad socioeconomic programs to reduce poverty, improve 68 US Congress, Senate Committee on Foreign Relations and Senate Committee on Armed Services, vol. 2 (DC: GPO, 1957), 708. 69 United States Congress, Congressional Record: Proceedings and Debates of the 84th Congress, Second Session, Volume 102, Part 6, April 27 1956 to May 21, 1956 (Washington, DC: Government Printing Office, 1956). 70 Jussi M. Hanhimäki, The United Nations : A Very Short Introduction, 2nd ed. (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2015). 71 Üner Kirdar, Structure of United Nations Economic-Aid to Underdeveloped Countries (Dordrecht: Springer, 1966). 72 Krasner, Structural Conflict, 1985, 116. 73 Kirdar, Structure of United Nations Economic-Aid, 1966. 74 Krasner, Structural Conflict, 1985. 75 Nicholas A. Ashford and Ralph P Hall, Technology, Globalization, and Sustainable Development: Transforming the Industrial State (New York: Routledge, 2019).

248

S. M. MAGU

governance, manage crises, improve resilience, be good environmental stewards, use clean and renewable energy and achieve gender empowerment and equality.76 In 1990, the UNDP commissioned the Human Development Report (HDR). It defined development as “a process of enlarging peoples’ choices,”77 especially life expectancy where Africa’s lags by 10 years.78 The UNDP helped draft and implement the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) in 2000. These have often been critiqued as elitist foreign to those they target.79 In 2015, the MDGs sunset; the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) became the NKOTB, with a proposed 2030 sunset. The UNDP coordinates, cooperates and works closely the O/AU, but also in bilateral and multilateral forums, undergirded by a 1964 UN resolution by proclamation, to cooperate with the OAU, and mutual, reciprocal collaboration with UN’s agencies.80 The overlap of O/AU membership and the UN makes cooperation necessary, since “UN technical assistance to Africa is channeled through the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP).”81 O/AU and Global Trade Regimes: From GATT to WTO Trade and development are co-dependent and rely on economic development, evident in Modernization Theory. UNDP and GATT (WTO, 1995) have regularly worked with O/AU members to utilize trade and technical expertise in their own countries and through UN-supported institutions and programs. The General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade (GATT) was ratified in 1947 and entered into force in 1948. GATT was

76 Hanhimäki, The United Nations , 2015. 77 UNDP, Human Development Report 1990 (New York: Oxford University Press,

1990), 10. 78 Frances Stewart, Gustav Ranis and Emma Samman, Advancing Human Development: Theory and Practice (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2018). 79 Stephen Browne, Sustainable Development Goals and UN Goal-Setting (New York:

Routledge, 2017). 80 Wellington Winter Nyangoni, Africa in the United Nations System (Rutherford: Associated University Presses, 1985). 81 Edmond Kwam Kouassi, “Africa and the United Nations since 1945.” In Christophe Wondji and Ali A. Mazrui, Eds., Generale History of Africa: Africa since 1935 (Paris: UNESCO, 1993), 895.

7

REGION OR CONTINENT: O/AU DEVELOPMENT …

249

always ‘provisional,’ the ultimate goal to form the International Trade Organization (ITO). The Havana Charter for the International Trade Organisation (ITO) drawn up in 1948–9.82 It served major economies seeking to expand markets, increase trade volumes, and reduce tariffs. Both GATT and ITO objectives were taxing: as states joined GATT, select tariffs on external goods rose, barriers and protectionism persisted. GATT’s goal was to increase trade and cooperation, to improve citizens’ welfare, prosper, gain peace and stability and reduce conflict potential arising from labor, markets and resource competition.83 “GATT’s purpose is to promote liberal trade (trade as free as possible) as a means to provide economic growth”84 while reducing tariffs and protectionist non-tariff barriers (NTBs). Protecting vulnerable industries was allowed, but any MFN status given to one member should be extended to all GATT members.85 Soon, communist, developing and newly independent countries were invited to join GATT.86 It quickly became clear that GATT’s rule-making had not factored their participation, that reciprocity and free trade required opening their markets and competing against their recent colonizers87 given that GATT’s 23 founding members were all developed countries, besides Southern Rhodesia and South Africa. GATT was simply continued western dominance. “With the IMF and World Bank, the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade (GATT) became the third pillar of the liberal international economic order.”88 The O/AU soon conceded, stating that “the African Union (AU) is made up of its

82 Adam Szirmai, The Dynamics of Socio-Economic Development: An Introduction (Cambridge: Cambridge, 2005). 83 Francine McKenzie, GATT and Global Order in the Postwar Era, Cambridge (Cambridge University Press, 2020). 84 U.S. Congress’ Office of Technology Assessment, Trade and Environment: Conflicts and Opportunities, OTA-BP-ITE-94 (Washington, DC: U.S. Government Printing Office, 1992), 22. 85 Robert E. Hudec, Developing Countries in the GATT Legal System (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2011). 86 McKenzie, GATT and Global Order, 2020. 87 John Croome, Reshaping the World Trading System: A History of the Uruguay Round

(The Hague: Kluwer, 1988). 88 Adam Szirmai, The Dynamics of Socio-Economic Development: An Introduction (Cambridge: Cambridge, 2005), 527.

250

S. M. MAGU

constituent member states, and as such the African Union’s priorities at the WTO are African priorities.”89 African regional cooperation efforts continued, although RECs, by definition a form of MFN, threatened to contravene GATT rules. RECs and proposed customs unions potentially violated GATT’s rules, although were exceptions such as “article 24, which allows for customs unions and free trade areas”90 in developing and LDC countries. GATT-OAU relations faced more practical issues: South Africa and Rhodesia were founder members and for African states, that was a red line. After the British severed ties with Rhodesia and notified GATT, Rhodesia remained in GATT.91 In response, OAU members used a bevy of economic tools to right the wrong: pressure, embargoes, shaming, denial of overflight, landing and docking rights, and trade boycotts against countries funding or trading with colonial powers, including Israel, South Africa and Portugal. Although GATT preceded the AU, for practical and legitimacy reasons, Africa could not be ignored; it was necessary to keep OAU in GATT. The OAU was even urged to consider whether Namibian goods, diverted from or produced in South Africa, could be subjected to boycotts and exclusion from GATT rules.92 As GATT prepared to transition into the WTO, it helped African countries to negotiate better particularly through the Structural Adjustment Program (SAP) and the Washington Consensus, given the tanking of HDI indices. The Joint Integrated Technical Assistance Programme (JITAP) was a GATT facility for OAU members to help build capacity (institutional, human, technical) to negotiate better trade deals before the Uruguay Round of Agreements.93 Benin, Burkina Faso, Cote d’Ivoire, Ghana, Kenya, Tanzania, Tunisia and Uganda were the first 8 JITAP 89 Fatima Haram Acyl, “African Union Priorities at the WTO.” In Patrick Low, Chiedu Osakwe and Maika Oshikawa, Eds., African Perspectives on Trade and the WTO: Domestic Reforms, Structural Transformation and Global Economic Integration (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2016), 15. 90 James J. Hentz, South Africa and the Logic of Regional Cooperation (Bloomington: IUP, 2005), 132. 91 The Commonwealth, Commonwealth Survey, Volume 11 (London: Central Office of Information, 1965). 92 United Nations, The UN -OAU Conference on Southern Africa, Oslo, 9–14 April, 1973: Papers and Documents (Uppsala: Nordiska afrikainstitutet, 1973). 93 David F. Luke, “Trade-Related Capacity Building for Enhanced African Participation in the Global Economy.” In Bernard M. Hoekman, Aaditya Mattoo and Philip English,

7

REGION OR CONTINENT: O/AU DEVELOPMENT …

251

beneficiaries that improved their positions, mitigated WTO effects and maximized export goods capacity.94 African countries highlighted harms arising from free trade, difficulty competing with stable economies, protections from dumping and competition against SMEs. WTO’s protections often fell short of RTAs’ and RECs’ provisions services, labor mobility, investments, competition and facilitating trade.95 OAU’s affiliated RECs argued for flexibility to reach agreements beneficial to their members given possible tariff reductions and removal of barriers (e.g., SACU). If WTO rules were enforced, these benefits could be claimed by developed WTO members. Even with JITAP facilities, transition from GATT to WTO, was not smooth; it hid deep discontent that culminated in riots 1999 WTO Seattle Round of negotiations. Skewed world trade benefits favoring the west and the influence of Transnational/Multinational Companies (MNCs/TNCs) while railing against government subsidies elsewhere are rife. A hypothetical one-country-one-vote is used to reach decisions at WTO; most are reached by consensus, though one director general referred to it as ‘consensus by exhaustion.’96 Agricultural production has been one area of great African countries’ dissatisfaction given they are mainly agrarian. Per Badejo: rich countries […] tell African countries they cannot subsidize their farmers or industries, but the rich countries themselves, including those in Europe and the United States … African trade ministers have opposed the U.S. payments of subsidies to American cotton farmers, lowering the world price of cotton and driving African cotton farmers out of business.97

Rumor holds that French cows are subsidized at e3 per day; but the irony is aptly captured in other areas. “The EU subsidizes sugar-beet Eds., Development, Trade, and the WTO: A Handbook, Volume 1 (Washington, DC: The World Bank, 2002). 94 Supachai Panitchpakdi, Statement by Mr. Supachai Panitchpakdi, Secretary-General of UNCTAD, JITAP event at the 6th WTO Ministerial Conference, Hong Kong, China, December 14, 2005. 95 OECD, Regionalism and the Multilateral Trading System (Paris: OECD, 2003). 96 Tamar Gutner, International Organizations in World Politics (Thousand Oaks: CQ

Press, 2017). 97 Diedre L. Badejo, Global Organizations: The African Union (New York: Chelsea House, 2008), 79.

252

S. M. MAGU

farmers, even though it would be cheaper to make sugar from African sugarcane.”98 The issues that Africa objects to are myriad, but they are also especially basic, including possible loss of preferential trade through the 1999 AGOA act, the EU-ACP Lomé Convention and Cotonou Agreement, and that they are essentially running a race with hands tied behind their back given colonial experiences. Further, “the GATT/WTO has been seen as a status quo institution, acting on behalf of transnational business and their governments […] as potential or actual agents of a neo-colonialist project aimed at exploiting their resources without adequate compensation.”99 African arguments and objections run into existing rules built into GATT/WTO; in the 1950s, France demanded special (preferential) treatment for its African colonies) while the Generalised Scheme of Preferences (GSP) by the European Community, first applied to Africa, was a key component of the EU-ACP.100 African countries have disadvantages galore: Bretton Woods Institutions are controlled by OECD nations, also GATT/WTO founders. Apprehending the benefits and exemptions built into GATT that required JITAP assistance to even negotiations, OAU members had to borrow from IMF/World Bank, allowing them to build conditionalities favoring them and forcing reforms through SAPs, Washington Consensus, free trade, market liberalization, removal of tariffs and government divestment even with new corrective programs, e.g., the Poverty Reduction Strategy.101 OAU/AU did build bigger coalitions: the G90 brings together AU, LDCs and ACP states to advocate for developing and LDC concerns102 at talks, e.g., the 2001 Doha Round which ultimately aborted. 2020 ushered in COVID-19; its effect on global trade and economies is unknown. Most may revert to meeting Maslow’s physiological needs 98 Badejo, Global Organizations, 79. 99 Sherry S Marcellin, The Political Economy of Pharmaceutical Patents: US Sectional

Interests and the African group at the WTO (Surrey: Ashgate, 2010), 128. 100 Daniela Sicurelli, The European Union‘s Africa Policies: Norms, Interests and Impact

(Surrey: Ashgate, 2010). 101 Said Adejumobi, “The African Experience of Popular Participation in Development.” In Said Adejumobi and Adebayo Olukoshi, Eds., The African Union and New Strategies for Development in Africa (Amherst: Cambria, 2008). 102 GAO. World Trade Organization: Limited Progress at Hong Kong Ministerial Clouds Prospects for Doha Agreement (Washington, DC: GAO, 2006).

7

REGION OR CONTINENT: O/AU DEVELOPMENT …

253

(food, shelter, clothing, reproduction) and then reconfigure the life we know anew. Long into the pandemic, COVID-19 has ruined the global economy worse than the 2008–2009 global recession, 1997 Thai Crisis, World War II, perhaps even the Great Depression. Countries may recover and exceed pre-pandemic levels, powered by a world weary of no-contact, by globalization and interdependence. COVID-19 has elicited cooperation in vaccine research (and likely vaccine nationalism) and might lead to coordinated disease surveillance, perhaps even increase economic cooperation to recover quickly. It may drive new protectionism and tariffs as countries seek to protect local industries’ recovery. However, it pans out, COVID-19 will have long-term impacts. Because AU members mirrored the shut-downs down to stop transmission, weaker economies may require more time to recover. Conversely, given Africa’s 3% share of world trade and 4.98%, or US$6.6 trillion of the US$128.7 trillion GNP PPP, lower global presence may prove a blessing in disguise. After RECs and OAU/AU Comes Beast Mode: AfCFTA As a continental and foreign policy achievement, the nascent Africa Continental Free Trade Area (AfCFTA) appears to be the achievement, after 50 years, of one of OAU’s founding goals: a free-trade continental area with political federation ambitions. AfCFTA came into being in Kigali, Rwanda, in 2018. COVID-19 outbreak did AfCFTA no favors, halting global interactions and slowing trade at a near standstill. AfCFTA is less about AU foreign policy than it is ‘African domestic policy,’ but given the challenges of global free trade, RECs policies and MFNs, one anticipates furious negotiations to resolve issues arising in the future. For the 55 African countries, a ~1.4 billion population, a US$2.5 trillion (per The Economist, US$3.4) or US$6 trillion GNP, PPP economy and especially the participation of major African economies, inking AfCFTA was notable, COVID-19 notwithstanding. Rwanda, the site of this signing, was notable considering that 25 years before, the 1994 genocide was raging; despite many conflicts in Africa, Rwanda portends the possibilities available in all of Africa. Initially, 44 countries signed the AfCFTA agreement. Others signed the Kigali Accord rather than the agreement while Nigeria and South Africa, opting to stay out at first; this initial fence-sitting almost robed the agreement of one of its most significant stamps of approval. If Africa’s leading economies were not on board, what did that bode for

254

S. M. MAGU

AfCFTA? Ratification by the minimum required (22) countries took place in July 2018 and AfCFTA was officially running. UNECA predicted that by 2020, AfCFTA would increase intra-African trade by more than 50 percent. This, however, was before the great destroyer that is COVID19.103 When South Africa and Nigeria signed on in July 2019, major African economies were now on board.104 AfCFTA and the Action Plan for Boosting Intra-African Trade propose tariff removal on 90 percent of goods traded, free access to goods, services and commodities, create a single, liberalized market, remove restrictions on capital and people, establish a customs union, ensure sustainable growth and gender equality, increase global competitiveness, achieve industrial, agricultural development and food security and resolve dual REC membership issues.105 The latter is critical: as Nigeria signed onto AfCFTA, Muhammadu Buhari explained non-participation in the ECOWAS-EU Economic Partnership Agreement, arguing that “our industries cannot compete with the more efficient and highly technologically driven industries in Europe.”106 AfCFTA aims to “provide momentum towards the consolidation of regional economic communities and the Tripartite Free Trade Agreement, with more communities having to align themselves to the provisions and obligations in the […] AfCFTA agreement.”107 Activities, practices, policies, and protectionist trends that dampen intra-Africa trade by ~6 percent, including tariffs non-tariff barriers, will diminish. AfCFTA’s impact on governance, decreasing corruption, dumping and diversion of goods is expected to be positive.

103 Kingsley Ighobor, “Africa Set for a Massive Free Trade Area,” Africa Renewal Magazine—UN Blogs (August–November, 2018). https://www.un.org/africarenewal/ magazine/august-november-2018/africa-set-massive-free-trade-area. 104 Kim Cloete, “Africa’s New Free Trade Area Is Promising, Yet Full of Hurdles”, World Economic Forum on Africa (September 6, 2019). https://www.weforum.org/age nda/2019/09/africa-just-launched-the-world-s-largest-free-trade-area/. 105 African Union, “Agreement Establishing the African Continental Free Trade Area”,

The African Union. https://www.tralac.org/documents/resources/cfta/1963-agreementestablishing-the-afcfta-consolidated-text-signed-21-march-2018/file.html. 106 Ighobor, “Africa Set for a Massive Free Trade Area”, 2018. 107 United Nations Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD), Economic

Development in Africa Report 2019: Made in Africa Rules of Origin for Enhanced Intra-African Trade (Geneva: United Nations, 2019), 36.

7

REGION OR CONTINENT: O/AU DEVELOPMENT …

255

AEC or US-Africa: The RECs Highway Kwame Nkrumah’s vision of a United States of Africa decades ahead of realities has prospects of achievement through RECs. Fostering cooperation between the Maasai of Kenya/Tanzania, the Somali in Kenya/Somalia/Ethiopia and the Luo of Kenya/Acholi of Uganda evoke greater prospects for cooperation than those across the continent. Uniting Africa across huge distances is more feasible through RECs rather than continental apparatus. As the OAU transitioned into AU, it was inevitable that there was “established seven (later eight) Regional Economic Communities (RECs) to help coordinate the economic and monetary cooperation and integration of African states.”108 Some of the pillars just required strengthening, others were more advanced. ECOWAS was pursuing a monetary union, stymied by Francophone vs. Anglophone contests and suspicions. Even in RECs with greater harmony, members regularly undermine progress. Tanzania is often accused of slow-walking the integration efforts of EAC II members, fearing domination by the more ‘capitalist’ members of the bloc. Some integration efforts are considered antithetical to ujamaa philosophical traditions. In West Africa, CFA Franc members continued use of the CFA even as ECOWAS promulgated the West African Economic and Monetary Union (WAEMU) in 1994. ECOWAS now had two monetary zones. The West African Monetary Zone (WAMZ), comprising of non-CFA/non-WAEMU members (Gambia, Ghana, Liberia, Nigeria, Sierra Leone and Guinea), was formed post-Accra Declaration in 1999, committing to integrating the monetary union with its ‘rival’ by 2004,109 and to establish the Eco. In 2020, the tiff between the WAMZ and WAEMU became public; WAEMU moved to rebrand the CFA into the Eco rather than fold into a common monetary union. RECs, AU pillars, face a delicate (im)balance of regional, continental and residual colonial influences. ECOWAS, more than any other REC, suffers inordinately. The extent to which France influences former African

108 Terry M. Mays, Historical Dictionary of International Organizations in Africa and the Middle East (Lanham: Rowman & Littlefield, 2015), 3. 109 Paul R. Masson and Catherine A. Pattillo, Monetary Union in West Africa: An Agency of Restraint for Fiscal Policies, IMF Working Paper, WP/01/34 (Washington, DC: IMF, 2001).

256

S. M. MAGU

colonies evokes Francophone subservience is staggering, making Englishspeaking ECOWAS members chafe. Francophone countries “agree[d] with France to rename the CFA franc currency the eco”110 sixty years into independence. With regard to the CFA-Eco debacle, the “Central Bank of West African States will no longer be required to keep 50 percent of its foreign reserves in the French Treasury”; in addition, “there will also no longer be a French representative on the West African central bank’s board.” Renaming versus integrating WAMZ and WAEMU monetary union threatens to derail ECOWAS’ next logical accomplishment. There are many areas of collaboration, but also of ideological conflict. The WAEMU-France romance is a barrier to strengthening ECOWAS, while Tanzania’s evident reluctance to commit to greater integration points to other issues. Such disagreements are not unique to Africa; the Maastricht Treaty establishing the Euro/zone led to heated debates and defections. Achieving pre-monetary union baselines can be challenging. For West Africa, they include reducing budget deficits to below 4 percent of GDP, keeping inflation rate less than 5 percent, holding reserves equal to 5 months of GDP, keeping Central Bank advances to under 10 percent of tax revenues and other governance related issues111 that would harm economic development, reduce FDI and cause instability to spill over to the adjacent countries.112 Other issues affecting REC integration and development of monetary unions across Africa include political instability (seen in a recent Mali coup d’état), ethnic conflict (South Sudan), state intervention (Kenya, Ethiopia and Uganda military activities in Somalia), multiple memberships and duplication of administrative structures, meeting financial obligations, etc. Nonetheless, RECs are changing debates around trade, security and other key global issues

110 Madden Foresight Africa launch, “Africa in Focus ”, The Brookings Institution, January 18, 2020. https://www.brookings.edu/blog/africa-in-focus/2020/01/18/afr ica-in-the-news-waemus-eco-implementation-sahel-security-update-and-foresight-africa-lau nch/. 111 Masson, and Pattillo, Monetary Union in West Africa, 2001. 112 IMF, West African Economic and Monetary Union (WAEMU): Recent Economic

Developments and Regional Policy Issues; and Public Information Notice on the Executive Board Discussion (Washington, DC: IMF, 2003).

7

REGION OR CONTINENT: O/AU DEVELOPMENT …

257

and functioning as envisioned by neoliberal institutionalist theory, holding members accountable and in instances, changing behavior.113 Africa’s Economies, Trade Regimes, RECs and the Future Africa’s fortunes have been historically tied to and influenced by relations with other countries and regions and by economic issues, including colonization for resources. After independence, improving citizens’ welfare relied partly on trade. They followed different paths, often making decidedly unsustainable choices such as Kenya’s attempt to manufacture cars. Many have not broken the agrarian basis of their economies and continue to be dependent on the Global North. More than this, global systems were designed without Africa’s participation or input, and most of the last half century has been spent trying to change debate, rules and outcomes through IGOs, RECs, unilateral and bilateral compacts. Simultaneously, they have formed RECs and most recently, AfCFTA, a step toward economic and political federation of Africa. African countries have also been adept at organizing, bloc voting and utilizing new and old institutions to force changes to global economic arrangements, even as the World Bank, IMF and GATT/WTO were dominated by western countries. Programs such as SUNFED and UNDP, the New International Economic Order (NIEO) and the use of ECOSOC have ensured that Africa continues to advocate for changes in global (economic) order. The development of African Regional Economic Communities (RECs) now recognized as more plausible paths toward eventual continental unity through regionalism, and AEC/AU/UNECA African integration pillars was another (not necessarily) original or innovative idea, but one that has had useful outcomes from constraining war, to increasing intra-African trade, to allowing for greater cooperation and solutions to African problems in an African way.

References Acyl, Fatima Haram. “African Union Priorities at the WTO.” In African Perspectives on Trade and the WTO: Domestic Reforms, Structural Transformation 113 Malebakeng Agnes Forere, The Relationship of WTO Law and Regional Trade Agreements in Dispute Settlement: From Fragmentation to Coherence (The Hague: Wolters Kluwer International, 2015).

258

S. M. MAGU

and Global Economic Integration. Edited by Patrick Low, Chiedu Osakwe and Maika Oshikawa. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2016. Adams, Francis. The United Nations in Latin America: Aiding Development. New York: Routledge, 2010. Adedeji, Adebayo. Towards a Dynamic African Economy: Selected Speeches and Lectures, 1975–1986. (Foreword by Abdou Diouf and Kenneth David Kaunda; Compiled and arranged by Jeggan C. Senghor). Totowa: Frank Cass & Co., Ltd, 1989. Adejumobi, Said. “The African Experience of Popular Participation in Development,” In The African Union and New Strategies for Development in Africa. Edited by Said Adejumobi and Adebayo O. Olukoshi. Amherst, NY: Cambria Press, 2008. African Union. “OAU Charter.” https://au.int/sites/default/files/treaties/ 7759-file-oau_charter_1963.pdf. African Union. “Agreement Establishing the African Continental Free Trade Area.” https://www.tralac.org/documents/resources/cfta/1963-agreementestablishing-the-afcfta-consolidated-text-signed-21-march-2018/file.html. Arnold, Guy. Ed., Guide to African Political and Economic Development. London: Fitzroy Dearborn Publishers, 2001. Ashford, Nicholas A. and Ralph P Hall. Technology, Globalization, and Sustainable Development: Transforming the Industrial State. New York: Routledge, 2019. Badejo, Diedre L. Global Organizations: The African Union. New York: Chelsea House, 2008. Bhouraskar, Digambar. United Nations Development Aid: A Study in History and Politics. New Delhi: Academic Foundation, 2007. Browne, Stephen. Sustainable Development Goals and UN Goal-Setting. New York: Routledge, 2017. Cloete, Kim. “Africa’s New Free Trade Area Is Promising, Yet Full of Hurdles.” World Economic Forum on Africa, 6 September 2019. https://www.wef orum.org/agenda/2019/09/africa-just-launched-the-world-s-largest-freetrade-area/. Croome, John. Reshaping the World Trading System: A History of the Uruguay Round. The Hague: Kluwer Law International, 1988. Davidson, Basil. Modern Africa: A Social and Political History. 3rd ed. New York: Routledge, 1983. Dinkel, Jürgen. The Non-Aligned Movement: Genesis, Organization and Politics (1927–1992). Leiden: Brill, 2019. Edozie, Rita Kiki and Keith Gottschalk. The African Union’s Africa: New Pan-African Initiatives in Global Governance. East Lansing: Michigan State University Press, 2014.

7

REGION OR CONTINENT: O/AU DEVELOPMENT …

259

Eribo, Festus. “African Development and Innovation of Communication Technologies,” In Development and Communication in Africa. Edited by Charles Okigbo and Festus Eribo. Lanham: Rowman & Littlefield Publishers, Inc., 2004. Forere, Malebakeng Agnes. The Relationship of WTO Law and Regional Trade Agreements in Dispute Settlement: From Fragmentation to Coherence. The Hague: Wolters Kluwer International, 2015. Gorman, Robert F. “United Nations Development Program.” In Encyclopedia of the Developing World, Volume 1, A-E Index. Edited by Thomas M. Leonard. New York: Routledge, 2006. Gutner, Tamar. International Organizations in World Politics. Thousand Oaks: CQ Press, 2017. Hanhimäki, Jussi M. The United Nations: A Very Short Introduction. 2nd ed. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2015. Howard-Hassmann, Rhoda E. and Anthony P. Lombardo. Reparations to Africa. Philadelphia: UPenn Press, Inc. 2018. Hentz, James J. South Africa and the Logic of Regional Cooperation. Bloomington: IUP, 2005. Hudec, Robert E. Developing Countries in the GATT Legal System. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2011. IBP. West Africa Development and Business Opportunities Handbook, Volume 1: Strategic, Business Information and Contacts for Selected Countries—Benin, Burkina Faso, Cote d’Ivoire, Cape Verde, Gambia, Ghana. Washington, DC: International Business Publications, 2019. Igbokwe, Chinedum. History Maker: The Sule Lamido Regime, Radical Populism, and Governance in Jigawa State, Vol. 2. Bloomington: Xlibris, 2017. Ighobor, Kingsley. “Africa Set for a Massive Free Trade Area.” Africa Renewal— UN Blogs. August–November, 2018. https://www.un.org/africarenewal/ magazine/august-november-2018/africa-set-massive-free-trade-area. International Monetary Fund. West African Economic and Monetary Union (WAEMU): Recent Economic Developments and Regional Policy Issues; and Public Information Notice on the Executive Board Discussion. Washington, DC: IMF, 2003. Juma, Monica. Ed., Compendium of Key Documents Relating to Peace and Security in Africa. Pretoria, RSA: Pretoria University Law Press, 2006. Kaufmann, Johan. The Diplomacy of International Relations: Selected Writings. The Hague: Kluwer Law International, 1998. Kawenda, Diana Eunice. Legal reception and regional economic integration in Southern Africa. Hamburg: Anchor Academic Publishing, 2017. Kirdar, Üner. Structure of United Nations Economic-Aid to Underdeveloped Countries. Dordrecht: Springer, 1966.

260

S. M. MAGU

Kouassi, Edmond Kwam. “Africa and the United Nations since 1945.” In Generale History of Africa: Africa since 1935. Edited by Christophe Wondji and Ali A. Mazrui. Paris: UNESCO, 1993. Krasner, Stephen D. Structural Conflict: The Third World Against Global Liberalism. Berkeley: UC Press, 1985. Kwiatkowska, Barbara and Alfred H. A. Soons. “Transboundary Movements of Hazardous Wastes and Their Disposal: Emerging Global and Regional Regulation.” In Hague Yearbook of International Law/Annuaire De LA Haye De Droit International, Vol 5. Edited by A. C. Kiss Lammers. Dordrecht: Martinus Nijhoff Publishers, 1992. Leonard, Thomas M. Ed. Encyclopedia of the Developing World, Volume 3, O-Z Index. New York: Routledge, 2006. MacKenzie, David A. World Beyond Borders: An Introduction to the History of International Organizations. Toronto: University of Toronto Press, Inc., 2010. Madden, Payce. “Africa in the News: WAEMU’s Eco Implementation, Sahel Security Update, and Foresight Africa Launch.” The Brookings Institution— Africa in Focus. January 18, 2020. Accessed from https://www.brookings. edu/blog/africa-in-focus/2020/01/18/africa-in-the-news-waemus-eco-imp lementation-sahel-security-update-and-foresight-africa-launch/. Makhan, Vijay S. Economic Recovery in Africa: The Paradox of Financial Flows. New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2002. Malitza, Mircea and Ana Maria Sandi. “The NIEO and the Learning Processes of Society.” In Social and Cultural Issues of the New International Economic Order. Edited by Jorge A. Lozoya and Haydee Birgin. New York: Pergamon Press, 1991. Marcellin, Sherry S. The Political Economy of Pharmaceutical Patents: US Sectional Interests and the African group at the WTO. Surrey: Ashgate Publishing Limited, 2010. Masson, Paul R. and Catherine A. Pattillo. Monetary Union in West Africa: An Agency of Restraint for Fiscal Policies, IMF Working Paper, WP/01/34. Washington, DC: IMF, 2001. Matthews, Alan. Regional Integration and Food Security in Developing Countries. Rome: FAO, 2003. Mays, Terry M. Historical Dictionary of International Organizations in Africa and the Middle East. Lanham: Rowman & Littlefield, 2015. McDonald, Gordon, C. Donald, W. Bernier, Lyle E. Brenneman, Eileen M. Colligan, Wayne A. Culp, Susan R. MacKnight and Michael L. Meissenburg. Area Handbook for the Democratic Republic of the Congo (Congo Kinshasa). Washington, DC: U.S. Government Printing Office, 1971.

7

REGION OR CONTINENT: O/AU DEVELOPMENT …

261

Merill, Karen. “Oil.” In The Palgrave Dictionary of Transnational History: From the Mid-19th Century to the Present Day. Edited by Akiya Iriye and Pierre-Yves Saunier. New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2009. Miškovi´c, Nataša. “Introduction.” In The Non-Aligned Movement and the Cold War: Delhi—Bandung—Belgrade. Edited by Nataša Miškovi´c, Harald FischerTiné and Nada Boskovska. New York: Routledge, 2014. Momanyi, Clara. “Miaka Hamsini ya Ujenzi wa Taswira ya Mwanamke Katika Ushairi wa Kiswahili Nchini Kenya.” In Miaka Hamsini ya Kiswahili Nchini Kenya. Edited by Inyani Simala, Leonard Chacha and Miriam Osore. Nairobi: Twaweza Communications, 2014. Mukherjee, Sakti and Indrani Mukherjee. A New International Economic Order. New Delhi: Mittal, 1985. Nhemachena, Artwell. “Anticipating African Economic Futures—Or Is It Time to Look in the Rear-View Mirrors? Land Restitution, Unemployment and the Figure of the Posthuman.” In Grid-Locked African Economic Sovereignty: Decolonising the Neo-Imperial Socio-Economic and Legal Force-Fields in the 21st Century. Edited by Tapiwa Victor Warikandwa, Artwell Nhemachena, Nkosinothando Mpofu and Howard Chitimira. Bamenda: Langaa, 2019. Nderitu, Alice Wairimu. Kenya, Bridging Ethnic Divides: A Commissioner’s Experience on Cohesion and Integration. Nairobi: Mdahalo Bridging Divides, 2018. Northrup, David. Indentured Labor in the Age of Imperialism, 1834–1922. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1995. Nyangoni, Wellington Winter. Africa in the United Nations System. Rutherford: AU Presses, 1985. OECD. Regionalism and the Multilateral Trading System. Paris: OECD, 2003. Panford, Kwamina. “The Transition from the Organization of African Unity to the African Union.” In Africa’s Development in the Twenty-first Century: Pertinent Socio-economic and Development Issues. Edited by Kwadwo KonaduAgyemang and Martin Kwamina Panford. Burlington: Ashgate, 2006. Panitchpakdi, Supachai. Statement by Mr. Supachai Panitchpakdi, SecretaryGeneral of UNCTAD, JITAP Event at the 6th WTO Ministerial Conference, Hong Kong, China, December 14, 2005. https://unctad.org/en/pages/SGS tatementArchive.aspx?ReferenceItemId=11538. Prasad, P. S. Narayan. “The Long and Arduous Road Towards a New International Economic Order.” In The New International Economic Order Perspectives: The NIEO Perspectives (Towards a Global Concern). Edited by K. C. Reddy, M. Jagdeswara Rao and S. Chandrasekhar. New Delhi: Ashish Publishing House, 1991. Roach, Steven C., Martin Griffiths and Terry O’Callaghan. International Relations: The Key Concepts, 3rd Edition. New York: Routledge, 2014.

262

S. M. MAGU

Sicurelli, Daniela. The European Union’s Africa Policies: Norms, Interests and Impact. Surrey: Ashgate, 2010. von Sivers, Peter, Charles A. Desnoyers and George B. Stow. Patterns of World History: Volume Two: Since 1400. 3rd ed. New York: Oxford University Press, 2017. Staples, Amy L. S. The Birth of Development: How the World Bank, Food and Agriculture Organization, and World Health Organization Changed the World, 1945–1965. Kent, OH: Kent State University Press, 2006. Stewart, Frances Gustav Ranis and Emma Samman. Advancing Human Development: Theory and Practice. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2018. Szirmai, Adam. The Dynamics of Socio-Economic Development: An Introduction. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2005. Teriba, Owodunni. “Regional and Subregional Perspectives.” In The Challenge of African Economic Recovery and Development. Edited by Adebayo Adedeji, Owodunni Teriba and Patrick Bugembe. London: Frank Cass, 2004. Toye, John. “Assessing the G77: 50 Years After UNCTAD and 40 Years After the NIEO.” In Emerging Powers and the UN: What Kind of Development Partnership? Edited by Thomas G Weiss and Adriana Ethal Abdenur. New York: Routledge, 2016. UNDP. “About us.” https://www.undp.org/content/undp/en/home/aboutus/organisational-chart.html. UNCTAD. Economic Development in Africa Report 2019: Made in Africa Rules of Origin for Enhanced Intra-African Trade. Geneva: United Nations, 2019. United Nations. “Overview,” United Nations Commission for Africa. URL: https://www.uneca.org/pages/overview. United Nations. The UN-OAU Conference on Southern Africa, Oslo, 9–14 April, 1973: Papers and Documents. Uppsala: Nordiska afrikainstitutet, 1973. United Nations Development Program (UNDP). Human Development Report 1990. New York: Oxford University Press, 1990. United Nations Economic and Social Council (ECOSOC). United Nations Economic Commission for Africa (UNECA—1958–10). Terms of reference of the Economic Commission for Africa: Resolution 671 A (XXV), 1017th Meeting, 26th Session (29 April 1958), Addis Ababa. http://hdl.handle.net/ 10855/16002. US Congress. Congressional Record: Proceedings and Debates of the 84th Congress, 2nd Session, Vol. 102, Part 6, April 27, 1956–May 21, 1956. Washington, DC: GPO, 1956. US Congress. Senate Hearings (Senate Committee on Foreign Relations and Senate Committee on Armed Services), Vol. 2. Washington, DC: Government Printing Office, 1957. US State Department. The Department of State Bulletin, Volume 52, No. 1332, January 4, 1965. Washington, DC: US State Department, 1965.

7

REGION OR CONTINENT: O/AU DEVELOPMENT …

263

US State Department. Intelligence Report, Issue 8228 (March 22, 1960). Washington DC: United States Department of State—Bureau of Intelligence and Research, 1960. US Government Accountability Office (GAO). World Trade Organization: Limited Progress at Hong Kong Ministerial Clouds Prospects for Doha Agreement. Washington, DC: GAO, 2006. Whiteman, Kaye. “A History of the ACP-EU Relationship: The Origins and Spirit of Lomé.” In The ACP Group and the EU Development Partnership: Beyond the North-South Debate. Edited by Annita Montoute and Kudrat Virk. New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2017. Wolhuter, C. C. “Education in Sub-Saharan Africa.” In Annual Review of Comparative and International Education 2018. Edited by Alexander W. Wiseman. Bingley: Emerald, 2019. The World Bank, “Life Expectancy at Birth, Total (years)—Kenya,” World Bank Data. https://data.worldbank.org/indicator/SP.DYN.LE00.IN?locati ons=KE&display=graph. Wouters, Jan, Cedric Ryngaert, Tom Ruys and Geert De Baere. International Law: A European Perspective. New York: Hart, 2018. Young, Crawford. The African Colonial State in Comparative Perspective. New Haven: Yale, 1994.

CHAPTER 8

Between BRICs’ Promise and Past Western Trauma: Whither, Africa?

Introduction The 1960s presented Africa with opportunities borne of liberation, but also persistent challenges. Europe had faded into the arena of US-USSR competition, everything was Washington and the Kremlin, African nations were peripheral. Cold War arms races made even European tiffs against Egypt pale. New players were rising and contending for global influence; China was shedding shadows of empire, warlords, Japanese occupation and increasing its influence and socialist future. Whereas Russia was still the USSR and China its client state, and all BRICs could potentially have risen to global contenders, it was China that distinguished itself. It received Soviet aid during its civil war, had exerted military muscle in Korea and Vietnam, and portended a new path to success for African countries. Rather interestingly, China and India were catching great powers’ bug, with intrastate and interstate conflicts. The USSR broke up on Christmas day in 1991; Rossiyskaya Federatsiya (Russia) assumed USSR’s debts, privileges and immunities. It started dealing with ‘divorce’ issues: allocating military bases, and other equipment, nuclear missiles, Baikonur Cosmodrome and other separation issues. In the west, the EU was progressively watering down states’ central raison d’être—critical functions like border control, immigration and common Euro currency through the EU and EMU. China grew rapidly despite many ill-advised social and economic programs that led © The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2021 S. M. Magu, Explaining Foreign Policy in Post-Colonial Africa, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-62930-4_8

265

266

S. M. MAGU

to the deaths of millions. Yet the US failed to capitalize on support for decolonization to garner even more influence. As constituted, BRICs have the human capital: Brazil (210 million), Russia (146 million), India (1.35 billion) and China (1.45 billion); this 3.15 billion (2020) is 42.1% of the global population. Africa’s 1.39 billion is in the same category. Economically, the countries’ ~US$21 trillion economies approximate the US,’ almost 25% of the world’s total. In particular, China and India, the former growing rapidly, portended a growth model that African countries could follow. China’s massive investments in Africa have raised concerns about nefarious intentions and outcomes: corruption, human rights violations, conflict, bad governance, etc.,1 a valid concern given China’s past.2 However, China decidedly would want a return on investment, an incentive to assure peace.3 China’s interactions with Africa are seen to positively impact “industrialization, urbanization, education, communication, mobilization, [and] political incorporation”4 This chapter assesses BRICs–Africa relations: durability and being beneficial to other countries.

Brazil: Portugal’s Twin and Reluctant Suitor? BRICs and their growing impact on world order have received increasing scholastic scrutiny, but their interactions with the Global South (besides China) rarely have. Brazil’s interactions with African countries and institutions are affected by relations with Portugal, reticent colonial power that incurred the OAU’s collective wrath. Brazil has also been stymied by domestic politics, military leadership and asunder, the bipolar dominance of the US vs. USSR. Brazil’s relations with Africa and Portugal goes back to the 1500 s and the sale of 10+ million Africans into slavery, many who departed ports in Angola, Congo and Mozambique,

1 Kofi Addo, Core Labour Standards and International Trade: Lessons from the Regional

Context (Heidelberg: Springer-Verlag, 2015). 2 Gizachew Wondie, China’s Foreign Policy and Its Human Rights Impact in Africa. A Comparative Study of Ethiopia and Uganda (Berlin: Grin Verlag, 2015). 3 Meine Pieter van Dijk, “The Impact of the Chinese in Other African Countries and Sectors.” In Meine Pieter van Dijk, Ed., The New Presence of China in Africa (Amsterdam: Amsterdam University Press, 2009). 4 Adam Przeworski, Michael E. Alvarez, José Antonio Cheibub and Fernando Limongi, Democracy and Development: Political Institutions and Well-Being in the World, 1950–1990 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2000), 88.

8

BETWEEN BRICS’ PROMISE AND PAST WESTERN …

267

were carried on Portuguese vessels (45 percent) and mostly ended up in Brazil (~40 percent).5 Africans were not the first go-to as sources of labor to produce sugarcane, tobacco and coffee: “Indian slaves […] proved themselves (or contrived to prove themselves) inferior to blacks, in endurance, commitment and docility.”6 To meet demand for coffee, “Brazil’s coffee plantations expanded at an astronomical rate, feeding the world’s soaring demand for caffeine,”7 resulting in the sale and transport of up to 100,000 from the 1830.8 After slavery was outlawed in 1807 and the 1837 Abolition of Slavery Act,9 the Royal Navy established in 1808 the West Africa Squadron based in Sierra Leone, designed to board suspected slavers.10 By 1820, slavery was deemed “an act of piracy” punishable by death. US President Monroe authorized deployment of US Navy ships to West Africa and the South Atlantic, specifically to seize American ships involved in the Atlantic slave trade.11 By the 1840s and 1850s, the British West African Squadron had 27 warships; and unlike taming piracy in the Indian Ocean and South China Sea, anti-slavery as humanitarian acts became a source of pride to its sailors.12 Portugal abolished slavery in 1836 and Brazil in 1888; abolition was favored by King Dom Pedro II and Brazilian elites.13 Dom Pedro II “never had slaves, was contrary to slavery and promoted abolition”14 and strove to “consciously avoid the bloody course taken by the United

5 Hugh Thomas, The Slave Trade: The Story of the Atlantic Slave Trade: 1440–1870 (New York: Simon & Schuster, 1997). 6 Thomas, The Slave Trade, 1997, 220–221. 7 Edward E. Baptist, The Half Has Never Been Told: Slavery and the Making of American

Capitalism (New York: Basic Books, 2014), 197–198. 8 Baptist, The Half has never Been Told, 2014, 298. 9 W. E. B. Du Bois, The Suppression of the African Slave Trade to the United States of

America 1638–1870 (New York: Cosimo Classics, 2007), 245. 10 John Broich, Squadron: Ending the African Slave Trade (New York: Overlook Duckworth, 2017). 11 Bernard Edwards, Royal Navy Versus the Slave Traders: Enforcing Abolition at Sea, 1808–1898 (Dulles: Potomac Books, 2006). 12 Mary Wills, Envoys of Abolition: British Naval Officers and the Campaign Against the Slave Trade in West Africa (Liverpool: Liverpool University Press, 2019). 13 Enrico Dal Lago, American Slavery, Atlantic Slavery, and Beyond: The U.S. “Peculiar Institution” in International Perspective (New York: Routledge, 2013). 14 Alessandro Nicoli de Mattos, Understanding Brazil for Foreigners (Smashwords, 2014), n.p.

268

S. M. MAGU

States”15 while managing Brazil’s abolitionist movement. Dom Pedro’s efforts ran into opposition by powerful republican property owners who favored the continuation of slavery. Brazil’s path to independence from the Portuguese Kingdom was long: despite Dom Pedro I’s famous oratory: “Brazilians, Independence or death,”16 he abdicated in favor of his son in 1831.17 Dom Pedro II’s daughter, Princess Isabella signed the emancipation decree18 and the Brazilian Empire and Dom Pedro II’s reign ended in 188919 ; but its version of caudillismo was afoot.20 Dom Pedro desired that “Brazil should develop as a European country and enjoy European standards of civilization.”21 He presided over “political stability and economic growth through railroad, telegraph and trade developments [which] allowed Brazil to emerge as a hemispheric power, as did success in wars against Argentina, Uruguay and Paraguay.”22 Through the nineteenth century, its plantation, slave-fueled economy would soon recalibrate, but the question of former slaves lingered. The latter’s “bondage so crippled AfroBrazilians as a social group”23 that integration into Brazilian society was not achieved. Further, Brazilian “military governments also built on a traditional notion of gradenza […] proclaiming the goal of transforming 15 David B. Davis, The Problem of Slavery in Western Culture (New York: Oxford University Press, 1966), 226. 16 Clayton Sedgwick Cooper, The Brazilians and Their Country (London: William Heinemann, 1919), 47. 17 Encyclopedia America Corp., The Encyclopedia Americana: A Library of Universal Knowledge (Albany: Lyon, 1919). 18 Rebecca Scott, “A Note of Introduction.” In Rebecca Scott et al., Eds., The Abolition of Slavery and the Aftermath of Emancipation in Brazil (Durham, NC: Duke University Press, 1988). 19 Tom Winterbottom, A Cultural History of Rio de Janeiro after 1889: Glorious Decadence; (New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2016). 20 Jacques Lambert, Latin America: Social Structure and Political Institutions (Berkeley: UC Press, 1967). 21 Malyn Newitt, The Braganzas: The Rise and Fall of the Ruling Dynasties of Portugal

and Brazil , 1640–1910 (London: Reaktion Books, 2019), 305. 22 Winterbottom, A Cultural History of Rio de Janeiro, 2016, 136. 23 George Reid Andrews, “Black and White Workers: São Paulo, Brazil, 1888–1928.” In

Rebecca Scott, Seymour Drescher, Hebe Maria Mattos de Castro, George Reid Andrews and Robert M. Levine, Eds., The Abolition of Slavery and the Aftermath of Emancipation in Brazil (Durham, NC: Duke University Press, 1988), 85.

8

BETWEEN BRICS’ PROMISE AND PAST WESTERN …

269

Brazil into a great power of imperial dimensions.”24 Its growing influence was regional and rarely directed at Africa.25 Brazil recognized its ‘new relationship with Africa’ was predicated on negotiating its relationship with Portugal. Gibson Barboza, a former Brazilian foreign minister, stated that he “immediately confronted the tremendous obstacle that the Portuguese colonial problem presented […] as an Atlantic country, Brazil will have interests and responsibilities on the other side of the ocean that bathes our shores.”26 He aimed to “eliminate the climate of mistrust, coldness and even veiled hostility toward Brazil that could take root in Africa because of the position we have traditionally taken on the problem of Portugal’s territories.”27 Portugal finally gave up its African colonies in 1975, potentially improving relations with Africa; yet its support for and providing weapons to apartheid South Africa, then locked in a conflict with an independenceseeking Namibia all but assured that Brazil was not out of the woods yet. Brazil desired greater global influence through the Non-Aligned Movement. From 1961, it shifted “its traditional alignment with the United States and the Western world [and] gave primacy to its place in, and relations with, the non-Western world, especially the countries of Africa and Asia.”28 Jânio Quadros’ rule saw an ‘independent foreign policy’; diplomatic overtures toward Africa, government scholarships and a mini-Student Airlift of African students to Brazilian universities occurred, but was terminated by Quadros’ resignation 7 months later and his successor’s (João Goulart) overthrow in 1964. Brazil’s foreign policy ‘reset,’ realigning with Portugal, and declining to participate in a ‘multilateral peace force’ to Namibia.29 Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva’s presidency favored better relations with Africa. Brazil sought membership in a 24 Jörg Husar, Framing Foreign Policy in India, Brazil and South Africa: On the

Like-Mindedness of the IBSA States (Cham: Springer, 2016), 101. 25 Pedro Feitoza, “Historical Trajectories of Protestantism in Brazil, 1810–1960.” In Eric Miller and Ronald J. Morgan, Eds., Brazilian Evangelicalism in the Twenty-First Century: An Inside and Outside Look (New York: Palgrave, 2019). 26 Jerry Dávila, Hotel Trópico: Brazil and the Challenge of African Decolonization, 1950–1980 (Durham: Duke University Press, 2010), 142. 27 Dávila, Hotel Trópico, 2010, 142. 28 Wayne Selcher, Brazil In The International System: The Rise of a Middle Power (New

York: Routledge, 1981), n.p. 29 Selcher, “Brazil–Africa Relations”, 1981.

270

S. M. MAGU

restructured UN Security Council and aimed to enlist Africa’s 54 countries to neutralize Argentina or Mexico’s chances. Lula’s increased contact with Africa included 11 official visits (25 countries), doubling embassies and increasing trade especially with resource-rich African countries.30 Lula began a “Brazil–Africa Forum on Politics, Cooperation, and Trade”31 initiative and was involved in convening the IBSA Dialogue Forum (India–Brazil-South Africa Dialog Forum), ‘deepening ties’ with the community of Portuguese-Speaking Countries (CPLP), the Southern African Customs Union (SACU), ECOWAS, NEPAD and AU.32 Brazil was granted AU observer status in 2005 (together with Mexico and Argentina), signed a technical cooperation framework in 2007, and was represented at the 2010 ECOWAS Summit.33 Brazil convened a conference on Africans and Africans in the Diaspora that attracted 6 African heads of states, OAU Chair and several other delegations.34 Brazil has not held a formal forum in the tradition of FOCAC; the Brazil-Africa forum mostly featured scholars. Brazil’s ~US$2 trillion GDP (nominal) ranks it 9th, its GDP (PPP) per capita just US$16,000 but Brazil faces issues like poverty, COVID-19 infections, economic stagnation and other issues that constrain its ability to influence global politics. Russia: Still No Strategy The history of Russia/USSR/Russia again is replete with missed (in)actions in Africa, giving rise to suspicions of no sound strategy. This is not exceptional: the US didn’t have one until 1958. Most of Soviet actions in Africa were primarily a Cold War strategy—to thwart the US and its allies’ influence in a decolonizing Africa. Russia shows

30 Samuel Bodman, Julia Sweig and James Wolfensohn, Global Brazil and U.S.-Brazil Relations (New York: CFR, 2011), 60. 31 Christina Stolte, Brazil ’s Africa Strategy: Role Conception and the Drive for International Status (New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2015), 96. 32 Stolte, Brazil ’s Africa Strategy, 2015. 33 Danilo Marcondes de Souza Neto, “A Renewed Partnership? Contemporary Latin

America-Africa Engagement.” In Dawn Nagar and Charles Mutasa, Eds., Africa and the World: Bilateral and Multilateral International Diplomacy (New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2018), 221. 34 Rita Kiki Edozie and Keith Gottschalk, The African Union’s Africa: New Pan-African Initiatives in Global Governance (East Lansing: Michigan State University Press, 2014).

8

BETWEEN BRICS’ PROMISE AND PAST WESTERN …

271

neither interest in, nor strategy for African countries beyond weapons sales. Russia’s distance from Africa is considerable (although Cuba and Venezuela are too), but proximity, geography, ethnicity and ideology make the distance greater. Russia was always a limited power in Europe, Asia and its ambitions were directed at Eurasia. Its interest and intervention in Africa were more opportunistic than purposeful, the highest goal being to thwart the US and European powers, peeling support from them on account of colonialism. Unlike the US and Europe, Russia’s geographic location denies it a direct line of sight. Its closest point, Egypt, is smack amid Arabian societies; the historical interactions between the Christian Orthodox religion, Constantinople’s capture by the Ottoman Empire in 1453, and the see-saw of control of the region made recovering Constantinople Russia’s most important goal together with recognition by Europe.35 Russia’s first bilateral relations in Africa were with Ethiopia, the first diplomatic exchange occurring in 1897. Relations remained robust until World War I, though its importance progressively declined.36 After the 1917 Bolshevik Revolution, Ethiopia “allied with the entente [and] refused to accept representatives from Soviet Russia.”37 Diplomatic relations were restored in 1924, but Russia’s attempt to control some territories liberated from Italy would challenge relations.38 In the post-colonial period, Soviet interactions in Africa were haphazard, besides the grand strategy of weakening the US due to its failure to denounce colonization, and allies, the colonial powers. The paradox of democracy vs. colonialism gave the USSR unlimited ammunition, while its centrally planned economic models were attractive to Africa.39 Some African leaders professed socialism, based on African concepts of communitarianism infused with nationalism. The US and its allies often failed to grasp that most African leaders were nationalist and desperate more than they were socialist, that to unshackle their people 35 Lindsey Hughes, Peter the Great: A Biography (New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 2004). 36 Radoslav A. Yordanov, The Soviet Union and the Horn of Africa during the Cold War: Between Ideology and Pragmatism (Lanham: Lexington Books, 2016). 37 Yordanov, The Soviet Union, 2016, 3. 38 Yordanov, The Soviet Union, 2016. 39 Elizabeth Schmidt, Foreign Intervention in Africa: From the Cold War to the War on

Terror (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2013).

272

S. M. MAGU

from colonialism, they asked for help everywhere and the USSR helped. Soviet leaders exploited this, including awarding Lenin Peace Prizes to Nkrumah, Modibo Keita and Sékou Touré.40 Early in the 1960s, the USSR backed its support by deploying ‘technical experts,’41 although their true purpose was contested, and some suggested they were there to exploit them.42 The aid was tangible, utilitarian and beneficial: “the Soviet airline Aeroflot provided technical assistance and equipment to get the airline [Société Nationale Air Mali or Air Mali] underway.”43 That Soviets were making inroads into Africa led to founding the Peace Corps, although Jim Crow laws in the US’ south only complicated the narrative for the west. Soviet support of decolonization was part of Cold War global strategy. “Soviet-African relations in the 1970s reflect a willingness in Moscow to back a wide range of causes and regimes which have little in common apart from their need for external support and their readiness to accept Soviet support if no other source is available.”44 Some countries were selected for strategic regions, some for political reasons but also because liberation implied defeat for the US and its allies.45 The USSR aided the African National Congress (ANC) in its Zambian offices, as a counterweight to the US-South Africa alliance and assisted Joshua Nkomo’s (socialist) ZAPU against Mugabe’s ZANU in Zimbabwe.46 Soviet moves and gains were countered by the US with incentives, Guinea in the

40 Michael O. Anda, International Relations in Contemporary Africa (Lanham: University Press of America, 2000). 41 Young-sun Hong, Cold War Germany, the Third World, and the Global Humanitarian Regime (New York: Cambridge University Press, 2013). 42 Young-sun Hong, Cold War Germany, the Third World, and the Global Humanitarian Regime, (New York: Cambridge University Press, 2013). 43 Ben R. Guttery, Encyclopedia of African Airlines (Jefferson, NC: McFarland & Company, 1998). 44 United States Senate Committee on Foreign Relations, Perceptions, Relations Between the United States and the Soviet Union (Washington, DC: U.S. Government Printing Office, 1979), 234. 45 Odd Arne Westad, The Global Cold War: Third World Interventions and the Making of Our Times (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2007). 46 Westad, The Global Cold War, 2007.

8

BETWEEN BRICS’ PROMISE AND PAST WESTERN …

273

1960 s a perfect example.47 Soon, other regions were of greater import, including Afghanistan, the Middle East (Egypt) and Afghanistan. Old Games and New Players: Russia in Africa in the Post-cold War Era The collapse of the USSR bequeathed the Russian Federation to global order. Russia is a large country that occupies 12.5 percent of earth’s inhabited area and spans 11 time zones. Its first decade involved ‘self-care’ before engaging with the world. As Russia assumed debts and responsibilities of the former USSR, as capitalism thrived, deficits increased, taxes remained uncollected, corruption, mismanagement and suspicion of political instability persisted, a “too nuclear to fail”48 Russia appeared highly unstable. As Yugoslavia disintegrated, Somalia failed and the Rwanda genocide started, Russia was quiet, unable to effectively address emerging global events given its own circumstances. When engaged, Russia addressed issues territorially proximate to Asia such as Kosovar Albanians’ repression in the newly constituted Serbia and the situation in Bosnia.49 Interestingly, some Somalis fleeing the 1990 collapse resettled in Russia.50 Russia began previewing its future strategy and took unusual positions regarding Africa; in Rwanda, as the magnitude of the genocide became clear and fearing American overreach, Russia and China opposed deploying a peacekeeping force more effective than the Roméo Dallaireled UNAMIR, or accept RoE change to allow the protection of civilians.51 Russia and the US opposed military intervention despite death tolls rising by the hour.52 Finally, a force of 2500 was urged, against US,

47 Okoth, Pontian Godfrey, USA, India, Africa During and After the Cold War (Nairobi: UoN Press, 2010). 48 Michael Mandelbaum, Mission Failure: America and the World in the Post-Cold War Era (Oxford: OUP, 2016), 59. 49 William Shawcross, Deliver Us From Evil: Peacekeepers, Warlords and a World of Endless Conflict (New York: Simon & Schuster, 2000). 50 Migration Information Programme (IOM), Transit migration in the Russian Federation (Bloomington: IOM, 1994). 51 Linda Melvern, Conspiracy to Murder: The Rwandan Genocide (London: Verso, 2004). 52 Michael Barnett, Eyewitness to a Genocide: The United Nations and Rwanda (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 2016).

274

S. M. MAGU

France and Russia’s 500–1000 troops’ figure and UNAMIR’s proposed ‘necessary force’ of between 5500 and 8000.53 The past 20 years have seen Russia’s drive to recover empire and remain relevant, in part, given the global order, the US’ ‘unipolar moment,’ NATO’s expansion, expanding Europe and a rising China. The US’ war on terror, troops in Afghanistan, Iraq, drones in Syria, Libya, Somalia, West Africa and involvement in Yemen, Pakistan and Somalia have challenged Russia’s ability to influence world order. Vladimir Putin’s rise to power epitomized a ‘new’ Russia, recalling that “first and foremost it is worth acknowledging that the demise of the Soviet Union was the greatest geopolitical catastrophe of the century. As for the Russian people, it became a genuine tragedy.”54 Putin is considered to be rebuilding the now-defunct Soviet empire with most its actions directed at countries in the region. Invasion of Georgia in 2006, Ukraine in 2014 and its longterm involvement in Syria and backing Iran do preview Russia’s dreams of empire. Resurgent Russia: New Pro-Africa Global Actor or Stridently Anti-West (Again)? A few areas define recent Russia-Africa interactions. As one of two BRICs on the UNSC, it joined forces with the EU’s Operation ATALANTA, considered Libya’s outcomes in shaping its response to the Arab Spring and in October 2019, held the first Russia-Africa Summit and Economic Forum in Sochi. Russia and Africa have some related experiences: swiftly after USSR’s collapse, Somalia followed suit. Instability, conflict and warlords soon led to piracy off Somalia. A raft of UNSC resolutions led to the 2008 establishment of the European Union‘s Naval Force ATALANTA (EU NAVFOR). This allowed the EU to implement “a coordination unit with the task of supporting the surveillance and protection activities carried out by some member States of the European Union off the coast of Somalia, and the ongoing planning process towards a possible European Union naval operation, as well as other international or national

53 Romeo Dallaire, Shake Hands With the Devil: The Failure of Humanity in Rwanda (Toronto: Random House, 2004). 54 Associated Press, “Putin: Soviet Collapse a ‘Genuine Tragedy,’” NBC News (April 25, 2005).

8

BETWEEN BRICS’ PROMISE AND PAST WESTERN …

275

initiatives taken with a view to implementing resolutions 1814 (2008) and 1816 (2008).”55 Within the EU, Operation ATALANTA was authorized by EU Council Joint Action 851; it set the goals of ATALANTA as protecting of WFP ships, AMISOM mission, preventing armed robbery and piracy, monitoring fishing off Somalia’s coast and increasing EU and other IGOs capacity to working in the region, focusing on maritime security and capacity.56 Russia did not contribute to ATALANTA, or the 33-nation Combined Maritime Forces (150, 151 and 152) but it has often taken part in anti-piracy activities with Japan, India and China, under the “Shared Awareness and Deconfliction (SHADE) mechanism” where naval anti-piracy operations were underway.57 Russia was able to rescue one of its vessels and arrest the suspected pirates, later releasing them. Russia’s re/actions to Libya’s Arab Spring protests are intriguing. Russia abstained on the vote for UNSC Resolution 1973 (2011) establishing the No-Fly Zone. It established “a ban on all flights in the airspace of the Libyan Arab Jamahiriya in order to help protect civilians and […] to take all necessary measures to enforce compliance with the ban on flights imposed.” 58 The resolution set conditions for civilian protection, enforcing an arms embargo, a ban on Libyan aircraft and flights, an asset freeze and travel restrictions on Libyan government and high-ranking officials, and allowed the UNSG to create a ‘Panel of Experts’ to implement the resolution. Ten countries including US, UK and France voted in favor, none opposed and five (China and Russia inclusive), abstained. Libya’s No-Fly Zone was the first major test on the use of R2P, where the ‘principle of non-intervention yields to the international responsibility to protect.’

55 UNSC, “Resolution 1838 (2008)—S/RES/1838 (2008)”, https://www.un.org/sec uritycouncil/. Resolution 1838 was adopted during the 5987th meeting on 10/7/2008. See also: UN Oceans & Law of the Sea, “United Nations Documents on Piracy: Security Council resolutions on piracy off the coast of Somalia”, May 24, 2012. 56 EU NAVFOR Somalia, “Mandate”, European Union External Action. Available at

https://eunavfor.eu/mission/. 57 UK House of Lords & European Union Committee, Combating Somali piracy: the EU’s Naval Operation Atalanta, 12th report of Session 2009–10 (London: Stationery Office Limited, 2020). 58 UNSC, Resolution 1973 (2011) / S/RES/1973 (2011), UNSC, 6498th meeting, March 17, 2011. https://www.un.org/securitycouncil/s/res/1973-%282011%29.

276

S. M. MAGU

Other instances where R2P intervention seemed desirable and inevitable include Kenya’s 2007, Zimbabwe’s 2008 and Iran’s 2009 elections. Suspicions abound about Libya: that Europe was pre-empting the fallout of a failed state within sailing distance and millions of Libyans and African refugees pouring into Europe; after all, Rwandan genocide was worse, easier to resolve but far from Europe. The no-fly zone execution was a successful failure: it succeeded in confirming Russia’s suspicion that NATO was a hostile, expansionist, conflictual and untrustworthy partner, its (US) puppet master’s goal was regime change in Libya, perhaps as payback for the Berlin nightclub bombing and deaths of American servicemen, and the downing of Pan Am 103 over Lockerbie. But enforcing a No-Fly Zone without eliminating Libya’s offensive weapons was risky. Still, nothing did more to negatively impact future R2P actions than Libya. Russia, China and South Africa believed “NATO was exceeding the mandate approved in Resolution 1973 and had crossed the line between civilian protection and regime change. The resolution only provided for limited strikes to prevent violence against innocent civilians.”59 Beyond Russia’s ‘aggressor’ rhetoric, it saw Libya as a continuation Iraq and Afghanistan. Russia (USSR and after) and Libya had shared commercial and historically close relations. Libya was a weapons importer from the USSR and its proxy power in Africa; Russia was also building a railway line from Sirte to Benghazi.60 To the east, Abdel Fattah alSisi and Vladimir Putin signed deals for the purchase of Russian military hardware.61 Regarding the Arab Spring, Russia’s responses to events in Libya oscillated. First, it opposed sanctions, then agreed to support them, then opposed a no-fly zone by abstaining in Resolution 1973, and then critiqued NATO‘s implementation of the no-fly zone. It then offered to mediate between rebels and the government, encouraged Gaddafi to step down while opposing regime change,62 although late in 2011, calls 59 Chris Chivvis and Jeffrey Martini, Libya After Qaddafi: Lessons and Implications for the Future (DC: Rand, 2014), 5. 60 Karina Fayzullina, “The Arab Spring Through Russian ‘eyes’.” In Larbi Sadiki, Ed., Routledge Handbook of the Arab Spring: Rethinking Democratization (New York: Routledge, 2015). 61 Andrea Beccaro, “Russia: Looking for a Warm Sea.” In Karim Mezran and Arturo

Varvelli, Eds., Foreign Actors in Libya’s Crisis (Milano: Ledizioni Ledi Publishing, 2017). 62 Robert O. Freedman, “Russia and the Arab Spring.” In David Lesch and Mark L. Haas, Eds., The Arab Spring: The Hope and Reality of the Uprising (Boulder, CO: Westview Press, 2017).

8

BETWEEN BRICS’ PROMISE AND PAST WESTERN …

277

to revisit the no-fly zone and curtail NATO’s mandate grew.63 Gaddafi’s death and two rival rebel governments in Tripoli and Benghazi validated Russia’s fears; Iraq, Afghanistan and now Libya were good examples good intentions gone rogue.64 Russia convened its first Russia-Africa Summit in Sochi in 2019.65 While the outcomes of the summit were unclear, Russia discussed increasing its investments in Africa in future. Russia’s economic footprint in Africa faint and only in arms sales, mostly to Algeria, with one of largest ever Russian arms sales post-Cold War era going to Algeria at US$7.5 billion.66 One might be forgiven for proposing that Russia’s trade with Africa is more harmful than helpful. Russia-Africa future relations are still indeterminate. Greater regional integration in Africa and the newly inaugurated African Continental Free Trade Area (AfCFTA) portend major opportunities for Russia. On the other hand, it may be the start of a new rivalry with its southern neighbor, India, as India seeks greater engagement with the African continent.

The India–Africa Complexity By virtue of colonization, African countries’ experiences more closely mirrored those of India than any of the other BRICs. Brazil’s path to BRIC was different, but that of India is even more unlikely. Granted, at US$2.72 trillion, India has the world’s 7th largest economy in the world as measured by nominal GDP (Brazil’s US$1.87 trillion ranks it 9th) but the population tells a different story: Brazil’s population is 15 percent of India’s. Its GDP (PPP) is US$2104.20, HDI score of 0.65 (ranking 118) while 18 percent of its population, larger than Brazil’s entire population, lives in poverty. India’s membership of BRICs and its great-power politics is confounding, considering the proposition that it could do ‘rising’

63 Horace Campbell, Global NATO and the Catastrophic Failure in Libya: Lessons for

Africa in the Forging of African Unity (New York: Monthly Review Press, 2013). 64 Andrea Dessi, “The OSCE Mediterranean Partnership, Libya and the MENA Crisis.” In Andrea Dessì and Ettore Greco, Eds., The Search for Stability in Libya: OSCE’s Role Between Internal Obstacles and External Challenges (Roma: Edizioni Nuova Cultura, 2018), 43. 65 Landry Signé, “Vladimir Putin Is Resetting Russia’s Africa Agenda to Counter the US and China”, Brookings Institution (October 22, 2019) (Web). 66 Riad A. Attar, “Arms Modernization in the Middle East.” In Andrew T. H. Tan, Ed., The Global Arms Trade: A Handbook (New York: Routledge, 2010), 105.

278

S. M. MAGU

or ‘great power’ politics things. A revisit and potential improvement of relations between India and Africa is necessary, almost overdue even if such relations are not necessarily based on what India can do for Africa. Historical and trade relations between Africa and India date back to 740 AD. Contacts were facilitated by Arabs who traveled to Sofala, Madagascar to India and Ceylon.67 Coastal Swahili people and Arabs served as trade intermediaries.68 “The Zanzibaris used Indian currency, issued and used by Arab and Indian representatives of Indian finance houses in Bombay and elsewhere.”69 The British found Indians’ knowledge of the oceans, currents, harbors invaluable; “the laboual sheetrs of officers of the Indian Navy have been the chief means of bringing the Somali coast of Africa to our knowledge.”70 The nineteenth and twentieth centuries saw Indians migrate to Africa for many: as pliant agents of British colonial expansion, as rail and port workers and businessmen. Initially, Indian labor was used to plant sugarcane by the 150,000 laborers sent to South Africa in the 1860s. Deemed insufficiently hardworking, they were divvied up between Durban and the north coast, taking jobs “on the railway and in the municipal Government.”71 They were in diverse occupations besides plantations. “Indians were employed in various sectors, such as the railways, the dockyards, coal mines, municipal services, and domestic service.”72 The numerical increase was reflected by suspicion they were opportunistic colonial collaborators. “The Indians who acted largely as customs officers, bankers, moneylenders and money-changers were the object of resentment, evident in

67 Mary Gunn and L. E. W. Codd, Botanical Exploration Southern Africa (Cape Town: A. A. Balkema, 1981). 68 Graham Connah, Forgotten Africa: An Introduction to its Archaeology (New York: Routledge, 2004). 69 John Middleton, African Merchants of the Indian Ocean: Swahili of the East African Coast (Long Grove: Waveland Press, Inc., 2004), 87. 70 Clements R. Markham, A Memoir on the Indian Surveys (Cambridge: Cambridge

University Press, 2015), 24. 71 Paul Younger, New Homelands: Hindu Communities in Mauritius, Guyana, Trinidad, South Africa, Fiji and East Africa (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2010), 14. 72 Felicity Hand and Esther Pujolràs-Noguer, “From Cane cutters and Traders to Citizens and Writers.” In Esther Pujolràs-Noguer and Felicity Hand, Eds., Relations and Networks in South African Indian Writing (Leiden: Brill, 2015), 2.

8

BETWEEN BRICS’ PROMISE AND PAST WESTERN …

279

the stereotypes of the time.”73 Indians were universally unpopular: they “were described by European observers as opportunistic ‘birds of passage’ who would go back to India after making a profit […] the bureaucrats may have looked down on Indians, but could not really do without them if the colonization of East Africa was to bring profits.”74 Where they settled in numbers, “Natal’s Legislative Council argued that Indians should also be barred from consuming or acquiring liquor as this would serve to halt the sale of liquor to Africans.”75 Outflows continued; 32,000 Indians worked as indentured laborers building the Kenya-Uganda railway. Almost 7000 settled in Mombasa and 1000 were in Nairobi by 1905.76 Transitioning from laborers to dukawallahs, colonialism and need for administrators meant the British could recruit Indians (1500), pay them less than Europeans for similar work, and keep them out of areas Europeans dominated, such as commercial agriculture.77 Over time, they took part in politics: Jeevanjee was appointed to Kenya’s LegCo. Discrimination was rife: during Nairobi’s 1908 plague outbreak “the colonial state stepped in, restricting ‘lower class Indians and the African natives’ to specific quarters for residence and small trading.”78 Indians chafed at this treatment; in South Africa, passes were required, precipitating Mahatma Gandhi’s 1908 protest by 3000 who burnt their passes.79 In East Africa they objected to ‘an inferior status,’ denial of participation, segregation and limits on where they could own land.80

73 Dan Ojwang, Reading Migration and Culture: The World of East African Indian Literature (New York: Palgrave, 2013), 10. 74 Ojwang, Reading Migration and Culture, 2013, 10. 75 T. J. Tallie, Queering Colonial Natal: Indigeneity and the Violence of Belonging in and

the Violence of Belonging in Southern Africa (Minneapolis: The University of Minnesota, 2019), 74. 76 Sana Aiyar, Indians in Kenya: The Politics of Diaspora (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 2015). 77 Aiyar, Indians in Kenya, 2015. 78 Aiyar, Indians in Kenya, 2015, 43. 79 Hand and Pujolràs-Noguer, “From Cane cutters and Traders to Citizens and

Writers”, 2015. 80 David Sunderland, Ed., Economic Development of Africa, 1880–1939: Labour and Other Aspects of Development, Volume 5 (London: Routledge, 2011).

280

S. M. MAGU

Self-inflicted Wounds? Inclusion, Rejection, Ejection Across Africa, despite treatment as 2nd-class persons, conflict between Africans and Indians was rife, e.g., in South Africa in 1949.81 “As successful settlers in East Africa, the South Asian community composed the middle stratum that created a cushion between the ruling British and the subjugated Africans.”82 The divisions were discernible, “Africans generally accusing the Asians of non-integration”83 although Africans were accused of adopting ‘pseudo-European values.’ Indians’ retention of cultural heterogeneity and culture rarely allowed ‘others’ in, especially Africans.84 As independence approached, it was unclear how African governments would address the ‘Indian question’ with over 360,000 Indians in the Diaspora.85 Nehru envoy, Apa Pant “reminded the Asians of East Africa that they were ‘visitors’ in this African land”86 despite participation in Legislative Councils (LegCo) as stakeholders. Some rose to prominence, e.g., Pio Gama Pinto, a close ally of Kenya’s first president Jomo Kenyatta. Responses to the Indian question varied across the continent. In Kenya, “in spite of his harsh treatment by the British, Kenyatta favoured reconciliation; whites who decided to stay on after independence were fairly treated provided they took Kenyan citizenship.”87 He inaugurated “democratic African socialism”88 and retained the status quo (capitalism) although a “majority of the former settlers in this country […] when they learned that this country was to achieve independence they went away because they were not prepared to come under the leadership of 81 Anthony Lemon, “The political position of Indians in South Africa.” In Colin Clarke, Ceri Peach and Steven Vertovec, Eds., (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1990). 82 Maya Parmar, Reading Cultural Representations of the Double Diaspora: Britain, East Africa, Gujarat (London: Palgrave Macmillan, 2019), 6. 83 Marie C. Lall, India‘s Missed Opportunity: India’s Relationship with the Non-Resident Indians (London: Routledge, 2001), 11. 84 Ravindra K. Jain, Nation, Diaspora, Trans-nation: Reflections from India (London: Routledge, 2010). 85 Younger, New Homelands, 2010, 219. 86 Younger, New Homelands, 2010, 219. 87 Norman Lowe, Mastering Modern World History, 5th ed. (London: Palgrave

Macmillan, 2013), 546. 88 _____, AF Press Clips, Volume 13, Issues 18–35 (Detroit: University of Michigan Library, 1991).

8

BETWEEN BRICS’ PROMISE AND PAST WESTERN …

281

our President, Mzee Jomo Kenyatta.”89 Piecemeal, there was friction, expulsion and deportation. In 1967, “Moi declared seven Indians and five Europeans to be prohibited immigrants, giving them twenty-four hours to leave Kenya” for “adopting a ‘racist attitude,’90 ” insulting and referring to Kenya as a ‘terrorist government,’ aiding the Shifta, calling KANU youth as ‘dogs,’ being ‘anti-African and not maintaining racial harmony.’ Idi Amin’s decree in 1972, mandating that all Asians depart Uganda within 60 days, is more widely known. Without addressing its merits or validity, it alleged ‘Africanization’ actions to fix Europeans and Asians taking advantage of Africans during colonization. Appropriation of land from White farmers in Zimbabwe in the early 2000s and South Africa’s land redistribution are pertinent, especially given the racial protests across the world in 2020. The count ranges from 23,000 citizens and 60,000 non-citizens, other stats show 13,000 citizens and 40,000–49,000 noncitizens; figures of 50,00091 and a final tally of “40 per cent of the total 60,000.”92 Amin’s justification appealed to a need to rebalance economic affluence. After rebuilding the railway and becoming dukawallahs, they started running cotton ginneries (100/155 in 1925) and investing in the coffee business. Europeans dominated government and the economy was split between Europeans and Asians, totaling to 2 percent of the population.93 Amin’s solution did not Africanize businesses; rather, it brought about significant upheavals and sowed doubts in the rule of law.94 Despite OAU’s begrudging objections to Amin’s actions, Uganda hosted the

89 Republic of Kenya, Kenya National Assembly Official Record (Hansard) June 1–July 30, 1965, Vol. V . (Nairobi: Government Printer, 1965), 1642. 90 Aiyar, Indians in Kenya, 2015, 273. 91 Mike Bristow, Bert N. Adams and Cecil Pereira, “Ugandan Asians in Britain, Canada,

and India: Some characteristics and resources.” Journal of Ethnic and Migration Studies, vol. 4, no. 2 (1975): 155. 92 Vali Jamal, “Asians in Uganda, 1880–1972: Inequality and Expulsion.” The Economic

History Review, New Series, vol. 29, no. 4 (November, 1976): 602. https://www.jstor. org/stable/2595346. 93 Jamal, “Asians in Uganda”, 1976, 604. 94 Mahmood Mamdani, “The Uganda Asian Expulsion Twenty Years After.” Economic

and Political Weekly, vol. 28, no. 3/4 (January 16–23, 1993): 94. https://www.jstor. org/stable/4399301.

282

S. M. MAGU

12th Annual OAU Summit in 1975,95 burnishing Amin’s credentials, although elsewhere, Britain was an ardent advocate for the expulsion of Uganda from The Commonwealth, whose meetings which Amin avoided attending.96 In 1983, Obote invited Ugandan Asians to return and help rebuild97 ; in 1986, Yoweri Museveni repeated the call, with assurances that 1972 was history. Predictably, reaction to Amin’s actions accused Nyerere of plotting with Obote to stage an invasion of Uganda from Tanzania in 1972 with “British intervention in Uganda to protect the Asian community who were being expelled.”98 In response, Amin requested help from Nigeria, Guinea, Egypt to shore up Uganda and Libya, which actually sent troops (from the PLO). At the OAU, Nyerere voiced opposition to Uganda’s actions but was condemned by some OAU members for attempting to interfere in Uganda’s internal matters, contrary to the OAU Charter99 ; the OAU “was responsible for blocking a vote at the United Nations on the ‘moral issues raised by Amin’s’ expulsion of Uganda’s Asian population in 1972.”100 India appointed Government boards to resettle more than 10,000 returnees but took no further actions. Majority of those expelled (29,000) were British passport holders who settled in Britain.101 Britain’s role in colonizing Uganda and creating the socioeconomic conditions robbed it of standing to raise much ruckus. Over time, relations between India and most of the other African countries stabilized, although internal dynamics and relations between Asians and Africans are akin to armed peace, including conflict borne of “the experience of Africans working for Asian employers as housemaids and those who work in Asian-owned businesses 95 Amii Omara-Otunnu, Politics and the Military in Uganda, 1890–1985 (New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 1987). 96 W. David McIntyre, The Significance of the Commonwealth, 1965–90 (New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 1991). 97 ———, AF Press Clips (Madison: University of Wisconsin Library, 1991). 98 Roy May and Oliver Furley, African Interventionist States (New York: Routledge,

2001), n.p. 99 May and Furley, African Interventionist States, 2001. 100 Brooke N. Coe, Sovereignty in the South: Intrusive Regionalism in Africa, Latin

America, and Southeast Asia (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2019), 108. 101 Ronald Aminzade, Race, Nation, and Citizenship in Postcolonial Africa: The Case of Tanzania (New York: Cambridge University Press, 2013).

8

BETWEEN BRICS’ PROMISE AND PAST WESTERN …

283

[who] complain of underpayment and poor conditions of service.”102 The new India-African engagement efforts might yet produce positive outcomes for both societies.

India Arica Forum Summit The India-Africa Forum Summit (IAFS) convened for the first time in New Delhi, India, in 2008, one of a flurry of attempts at engagement by countries seeking to burnish their global influence; others included FOCAC and Korea-Africa Summit.103 The first IAFS was different; India did not want to appear to be replicating TICAD, or FOCAC. “Its invitation list is symbolic: fourteen heads of state and the heads of all eight regional groups,”104 with anticipated cooperation in the areas of human resources, technology, industrialization, SMEs, minerals, health, ICT, security and judicial reforms.105 IAFS goals are ambitious and illuminate potential South-South partnerships; another goal of IAFS has been the improvement of relations between India and African countries. India also committed “to providing 50,000 scholarships for Africans to study in the country.”106 India‘s investments in Africa are increasing; its “total commerce with Africa grew rapidly from $25 billion in 2007 to $70 billion in 2015”107 and aims to provide a US$5.4 billion credit facility to Africa, provide preferential market access for 34 LDCs in Africa, while inking a deal with SACU. The numbers and rising trade conceal that South Africa spoke for US$7.5 billion of the total US$7.7 billion trade value.108 Kenya and

102 Kevin Shillington, Encyclopedia of African History: Volume 1, A–G, (New York: Fitzroy Dearborn, 2005), 192. 103 Brittany Morreale, “Asian Powers in Africa: Win, Win, Win, Win?” Book Review—

Prosperity. 104 Alex Vines and Elizabeth Sidiropolous, “India Calling.” The World Today, vol. 64, no. 4 (April, 2008): 26–27. 105 Vines and Sidiropolous, “India Calling”, 2008. 106 Rosaline Daniel and Dawn Nagar, “Africa’s Key Bilateral Relations in Asia: China,

India, and Japan.” Centre for Conflict Resolution (2016): 16. https://www.jstor.org/sta ble/resrep05137.8. 107 Daniel and Nagar, “Africa’s Key Bilateral Relations in Asia”, 2016. 108 James Thuo Gathii, African Regional Trade Agreements as Legal

(Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2011)

Regimes

284

S. M. MAGU

India inked an Indo-Kenyan Trade Agreement bestowing reciprocal MFN status in 1981; Indo-Africa trade exceeded US$1.2 billion in 2008.109 In an age of globalization and COVID-19, insularity can progress constrain. Tiffs between African and Indian populations in Africa and India often dampen prospects for cooperation. India’s ability to project power and repatriate 13,000 citizens from Libya during the Arab Spring is to be lauded,110 although its support for a no-fly zone contradicted AU’s position. Much common ground exists, IAFS can nurture it, and cooperation can be achieved in agriculture, trade, industry and investment, peace and security, good governance, civil society and ICT. The Great Suspicion: What Is China Doing in Africa? China‘s increased engagement and relations with Africa especially blossomed early in the twenty-first century, although they predate Zheng He’s voyages with fleets of up to ~ 28,000 sailors on 63 ships, early in the 1400s. Although the scale of these voyages dwarfed those of Europeans—Columbus, for instance, with his 3 ships and 270 men, China looked inward during the Ming and Qing empires. Its return to Africa resumed after World War II, engaging with Zambia, Tanzania and Angola. Building up its economy and manufacturing base, in the 1990s, it became the ‘factory of the world’. China declined from its eighteenth century global dominance to grave humiliations, end of Qing Empire and the warlords’ era, invasion by Japan between 1915 and 1945, postWorld War II civil war, to supporting communist allies (Korea, Vietnam). Khrushchev’s 1956 speech denigrating Stalin and denial of nuclear technology pointed to new paths, greater assertiveness and potential opportunities. Most importantly, coming out of a century of decadence and humiliations by the west through Opium Wars and unequal treaties, trade expansion might yet bring glory. China’s relations with Africa then were

109 Seema Shekhawat, “India, Africa and the IOR-ARC: Potential for Collaboration.” In Renu Modi, Ed., South-South Cooperation: Africa on the Centre Stage (London: Palgrave Macmillan, 2011). 110 Satish Kumar, “National Security Environment: Developments Pertaining to Asia, Africa and Latin America.” In Satish Kumar, Ed., India’s National Security: Annual Review 2012 (New Delhi: Routledge, 2013).

8

BETWEEN BRICS’ PROMISE AND PAST WESTERN …

285

on trade and aid111 ; its investments surged past US$ 100 billion in 2007, accompanied by questions and doubts on its motivations. Was it a new imperialist or a better capitalist? These are addressed in Chris Alden’s (2007) China in Africa 112 ; van Dijk’s 2009 volume addresses China in Africa’s 113 ; Shinn and Eisenman study a century of China-Africa interactions114 ; and Kachiga’s study of China’s Africa policy which debuted in 2013.115 China’s investments in infrastructure development projects—airports in Ethiopia and Kenya and the Tanzania-Zambia Railway (TAZARA)— have had notable impact.116 But even before the newest trajectory of capital-intensive projects, during the Cold War, China sympathized with Africa’s colonization and attendant consequences, supported liberation—from Bandung to Bangkok, advocated at the UN, engaged with especially socialist-leaning African countries and even as the US sent Peace Corps Volunteers, the UK sent VSOs and the USSR sent ‘technical experts’ to Africa, China sent ‘barefoot doctors’ and agricultural technicians to Africa, supported freedom fighters through training and weapons, and availed grants and low-interest loans.117 Granted, China has always denied any global ambitions, but in recreating institutions such as assisting newly independent countries with development assistance or technical expertise suggested that China was becoming assertive, and perhaps shedding its isolationist mantle. Colonialism and subsequent independence produced a flurry of interesting scenarios. They offered especially independent African nations the chance to pursue independence in their policy-making, separate from

111 Jean-Raphaël Chaponnière, “Chinese Aid to Africa, Origins, Forms and Issues.” In Meine Pieter van Dijk, Ed., The New Presence of China in Africa (Amsterdam: Amsterdam University Press, 2009). 112 Chris Alden, China in Africa (New York: Zed Books, 2007). 113 Meine Pieter van Dijk, ed., The New Presence of China in Africa (Amsterdam:

Amsterdam University Press, 2009). 114 David Shinn and Joshua Eisenman, China and Africa: A Century of Engagement (Philadelphia: UPenn Press, 2012). 115 Jean Kachiga, China in Africa: Articulating China’s Africa Policy (Trenton, NJ: Africa World Press, 2013). 116 Shinn and Eisenman, China and Africa (2012). 117 Elizabeth Schmidt, Foreign Intervention in Africa: From the Cold War to the War

on Terror (New York: Cambridge, 2013).

286

S. M. MAGU

the colonial powers. Not that the colonial powers were eager to let go; indeed, nations that picked fights with former colonizers and their machinations, such as Guinea, fell out or pursued similar policies benefitted from China’s largesse and projects, beloved because they offered a new development approach that helped them and validated China as a rising power. They included Algeria, Angola, Egypt, Ghana, Guinea, Mali, Mozambique, Tanzania, Zambia and Zimbabwe.118 By 1990, China was soaring on decades of sustained economic growth and was challenging the US regionally. Its resurgence was almost inevitable: for 5000 years it ebbed and flowed, a center of technological and economic prosperity. Its new engagement was circumspect, allowing computer imports and banning music videos, investing in human capital and education in the west even as accusations of intellectual property appropriation persist. China’s major competitor in Africa is a reticent US, its approach mostly ‘problematization’ and support for powers and positions opposed by Africa—supporting NATO ally Portugal and its continued colonization, apartheid South Africa, stoking and supporting conflicts in Congo and the Horn of Africa. Its 1992 Somalia debacle marked abandonment of its new world order (human rights, democracy) and stood by in Rwanda. Here, China reverted to its purported helplessness and non-intervention, but pursued “resource intensive” investments, mining and oil extraction.119 China’s exploitation of long-dormant natural resources was critiqued, though a continent sitting on wealth but dying of hunger defied logic. China’s attention shifted from its Cold War-focus on socialist-leaning states. In 2015, Nigeria, Angola, Ethiopia, Kenya, Zambia and South Africa were the top five recipients of China’s investments.120 At US$70 billion, China led in Foreign Direct Investments (FDI) to Africa from 2014 to 2018 although it supported fewer projects than the US, UK or France. China’s FDI led to 137,000 jobs, twice the second

118 Schmidt, Foreign Intervention in Africa, 2013. 119 David Dollar, China’s Engagement with Africa: From Natural Resources to Human

Resources (DC: Brookings, 2016). 120 Mariama Sow, “Africa in Focus: Figures of the Week: Chinese Investment in Africa.” Africa in Focus—The Brookings Institution (September 6, 2018). https:// www.brookings.edu/blog/africa-in-focus/2018/09/06/figures-of-the-week-chinese-inv estment-in-africa/.

8

BETWEEN BRICS’ PROMISE AND PAST WESTERN …

287

highest investor.121 China’s FDI addressed job-creation and infrastructure, whose neglect, posited against Africa’s youth bulge can positively impact the continent. China’s activities reflect priority areas, such as transport and energy (66 percent).122 For countries and citizens, Chinese investments are building railways (e.g., the Standard Gauge Railway (SGR) in Kenya, where the last railway was built by the British in 1899. FOCACs: Fleeting Fair-Weather Friends or True Partnership? Global, cataclysmic events are relatively—thankfully—rare. Granted, the Cuban Missile Crisis, the 1983 near-accidental nuclear launch, The Spanish Flu, the Bubonic plague and the occasional flare-up of Ebola have come close. In 2020, the International Committee on Taxonomy of Viruses (ICTV) named a new pulmonary illness, the 2019 novel coronavirus (severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2, or SARS-CoV-2, or COVID-19,123 a global pandemic with monumental impacts. Reactions to COVID-19 across the world have differed; China, accused of either purposely or otherwise releasing the virus, or hiding its magnitude, had numbers that demonstrated what to do, limiting infections to under 100,000 as 2021 dawned. Beyond the disputed figures and the shutdown of regions, China’s total infections were 12,000 short of US’ one-day highest tally on July 16; US was recording almost 200,000 daily cases. African countries largely avoided the high case counts; their containment strategies closely mirrored those of China. It dispatched PPE and experts to assist contain the outbreak in Africa, although the quarantine treatment of Africans in China was quite shoddy. China-Africa engagement is both continental and bilateral at statelevel. FOCACs abbreviated for joint Forum on China-Africa Cooperation, began convening in 2000; the fifth was slated for 2021. The Followup Mechanism after FOCAC I and II resulted in “signing bilateral investment protection agreements with over 20 African countries and

121 Payce Madden, “Figure of the Week: Foreign Direct Investment in Africa.” Africa in focus—The Brookings Institution (October 9, 2019). https://www.brookings.edu/blog/ africa-in-focus/2019/10/09/figure-of-the-week-foreign-direct-investment-in-africa/. 122 Sow, “Africa in focus”, 2018. 123 World Health Organization (WHO). “Naming the Coronavirus Disease (COVID-

19) and the Virus That Causes It.” World Health Organization (May 10, 2020). https:// www.who.int/emergencies/diseases/novel-coronavirus-2019/technical-guidance/namingthe-coronavirus-disease-%28covid-2019%29-and-the-virus-that-causes-it.

288

S. M. MAGU

establishing China Trade and Investment Promotion Centers in 11 countries on the continent […] 245 new agreements with African countries with regard to economic assistance […] which accounted for 44 percent of the total value of new agreements Beijing committed itself to with regard to foreign aid in that period.”124 During the 2014 FOCAC Summit, China proposed to “connect up Africa via regional roads and aviation, and high speed rail networks.”125 The proposals are followed by investment in necessary infrastructure—the Road and Bridge Initiative (RBI), the ‘Growing Together Fund’ with ADB, and a China-Africa Infrastructure Cooperation Plan after the 2018 FOCAC Summit.126 Chinese largesse benefits AU’s programs: US$1.8 million support to AU’s AMIS peacekeeping mission,127 AU Peace Fund, UN-peace activities in Africa,128 and generally supporting other AU institutional priorities.129 China is vocal about sovereignty, non-interference and pursues neutrality (except regarding Libya). “The Chinese stay out of African affairs and do not present themselves as saviors of desperate African souls.”130 It abstained in UNSC Resolution 1593 on Somalia/Darfur (deploying UN peacekeepers to Darfur), supported UNSC Resolution 1679 (strengthening the AU Mission in Sudan, AMIS)—according to China, “our political support for the AU.”131 When Libya’s Arab Spring protests turned into war, China “broke its traditional reticence to vote 124 Ian Taylor, The Forum on China–Africa Cooperation (FOCAC) (New York: Routledge, 2011), 50. 125 Jing Gu and Richard Carey, “China‘s Development Finance and African Infrastructure Development.” In Arkebe Oqubay and Justin Yifu Lin, Eds., China-Africa and an Economic Transformation (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2019), 153. 126 Gu and Carey, “China‘s Development Finance”, 2019. 127 Chiung-Chiu Huang and Chih-yu Shih, Harmonious Intervention: China‘s Quest for

Relational Security (New York: Routledge, 2014). 128 Taylor, The Forum on China-Africa Cooperation, 2011. 129 Marcus Power, Giles Mohan and May Tan-Mullins, China‘s Resource Diplomacy in

Africa: Powering Development? (New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2012). 130 Samuel M. Makinda, F. Wafula Okumu and David Mickler, The African Union: Addressing the Challenges of Peace, Security, and Governance (New York: Routledge, 2016), 156. 131 Niall Duggan, “China‘s Changing Role in Its All-Weather Friendship with Africa.” In Sebastian Harnisch, Sebastian Bersick and Jörn-Carsten Gottwald, Eds., China’s International Roles: Challenging or Supporting International Order? (New York: Routledge, 2016).

8

BETWEEN BRICS’ PROMISE AND PAST WESTERN …

289

for UN sanctions against the Gaddafi regime, although Beijing reverted to its policy of abstention by refraining from the vote for military action against Libya,”132 fearing reputational costs.133 It kept tabs on AU and Arab League positions regarding UNSC Resolution 1970 on the No-Fly Zone and abstained from UNSC Resolution 1973 implementation resolution.134 China was vocal on NATO violations, meeting rebel leaders “in an effort to safeguard Chinese investments in Libya.”135 China-Africa relations show endless potential—non-tariff access, opening domestic markets to African countries and debt forgiveness for African LDCs and HIPCs.136 It is helping the AU set up a rapid response force and one expects these kinds of interactions to increase. Inevitability: Superpower Collapse, New Neo-Colonialism and Global Counterweights Even in Africa, apprehensions about China’s intentions abound. From its TV and radio broadcasts in local languages to the proliferation of Confucius Institutes, China is accused of neo-colonial tendencies and stealing Africa’s resources, mass-producing goods, flooding local markets, involvement in agricultural sector economic activities, competing against SMEs and replacing locals in markets. Yet in poverty-stricken countries such as South Sudan, China’s activities are improving lives. Many Africanists question China’s benevolence or whether it is propagating neo-colonialism. Its treatment of especially minorities, the Uyghurs, Tibetans and dissenters, dismal human rights record and ‘ask-no-questions’ stance, while funding oppressive African governments. Conversely, discussions better suited to other forums might show that China’s investment in Africa is likely to undermine government non-responsiveness, producing a most unintended consequence—now that African citizens have an idea of the 132 Yang Razali Kassim, The Geopolitics of Intervention: Asia and the Responsibility to Protect (New York: Springer, 2014), 38. 133 Courtney J. Fung, China and Intervention at the UN Security Council : Reconciling Status (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2019). 134 Kassim, The Geopolitics of Intervention, 2016. 135 Ronald Bruce St John, Libya: Continuity and Change, 2nd ed. (New York:

Routledge, 2015), 162. 136 Zhiyue Bo, “China‘s Design of Global Governance: The Role of Africa.” In Benjamin Barton and Jing Men, Eds., China and the European Union in Africa: Partners or Competitors? (Burlington, VT: Ashgate, 2011).

290

S. M. MAGU

possibilities of government, political participation might increase and therewith, potentially lead to democratic norms. China readily concedes its interest in Africa, but notes that, unlike its western competitors, it has not colonized anyone. It is quick to highlight the hypocrisies of the western world: on the one hand, they advocate for sovereignty and non-interference in internal affairs of other countries but on the other, they readily do so in places such as Libya and Somalia and elsewhere. China also casts itself as Africa’s economic development partner, unlike the US and its western allies’ actions during six decades of colonialism. China is also quick to point out that concern expressed by former colonial powers conveniently ignores slavery and colonialism, decidedly black eyes in their righteous crusades. True, China might prop dictators—but…but Saudi Arabia, South Vietnam, Philippines and the Congo. That 70 percent of Africans surveyed across different countries have a positive view of China and its role in building infrastructure and facilities to access hospitals, travel better and more efficiently is difficult to dispute. It is helping African governments meet citizens’ needs; on this score, China is winning most of the arguments.

Concluding Thoughts Global order changes, sometimes significantly. Nations rise and fall, coalitions are born and broken, and new challengers to the status quo manifest. For the current global realities, BRICs are seen as the next, perhaps major global compact. This is borne as much out of hope as it is the reality, and a search for alternative social, political and economic paths. BRICs have been heralded as a new way to think about global order, yet a careful examination points to both the promise but also challenges. One does not expect India to invest in assisting Kenya build housing for its estimated 100,000 to 800,00 residents of the Kibera slum, while neglecting the estimated 1 million in Dharavi’s Mumbai slums, or Brazil rushing to do the same despite that 1.5 million live in the favelas of Rio de Janeiro. But perhaps this reflects the notion that relations between developing and BRIC countries are about how one group helps the other, as opposed to confronting the dilemmas of common interests and common aversions in a way that brings about relative, rather than absolute gains. Yet to the extent that BRICs seek to have some influence in other parts of the world, none have shown a more impressive effort than China. It is likely that

8

BETWEEN BRICS’ PROMISE AND PAST WESTERN …

291

some, such as Russia, are confounded by Geography, but also the meager history of interactions between the USSR, its successor Russia and Africa. For both Brazil and India, their march to global power seems to have been interrupted, and COVID-19 is a clear example. Many questions remain unanswered—some about the US and its role in the world, and others about China and what it is doing in Africa— whether the overall involvement of China in Africa is a net positive, negative or has no impact. As it continues to swing from one possibility to the other, depending on its interests, the region, and time period, these questions are still to be answered, its role in the world and especially in Asia resolved. China is here, it is invested in Africa, it is investing in Africa and its actions have transformed Africa significantly. Its internal structure appears to be more than a little troubling as a model for governance, but there is a corresponding withdrawal of the US from global affairs—at least as of 2020—and while this might change, much remains unclear. The devastation that has been, and will continue to be caused by COVID-19 may take time to determine, and all of these further complicate efforts to discern the future. China appears to play the long-game; it has an ‘African policy’ that supports continental-level initiatives, bilateral and regional engagements in pursuit of its Africa policy.

References ———. AF Press Clips, Volume 13, Issues 18–35. Detroit: University of Michigan Library, 1991. Addo, Kofi. Core Labour Standards and International Trade: Lessons from the Regional Context. Heidelberg: Springer, 2015. Aiyar, Sana. Indians in Kenya: The Politics of Diaspora. Cambridge: Harvard, 2015. Alden, Chris. China in Africa. New York: Zed Books, 2007. Aminzade, Ronald. Race, Nation, and Citizenship in Postcolonial Africa: The Case of Tanzania. New York: Cambridge University Press, 2013. Anda, Michael O. International Relations in Contemporary Africa. Lanham: University Press of America, 2000. Arlinghaus, Bruce E. African Security Issues: Sovereignty, Stability, and Solidarity. New York: Routledge, 2018. Attar, Riad A. “Arms modernization in the Middle East.” In The Global Arms Trade: A Handbook. Edited by Andrew T. H. Tan. New York: Routledge, 2010.

292

S. M. MAGU

Baptist, Edward E. The Half Has Never Been Told: Slavery and the Making of American Capitalism. New York: Basic Books, 2014. Barnett, Michael. Eyewitness to a Genocide: The United Nations and Rwanda. Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 2016. Beccaro, Andrea. “Russia: Looking for a Warm Sea.” In Foreign Actors in Libya’s Crisis. Edited by Karim Mezran and Arturo Varvelli. Milano: Ledizioni LediPublishing, 2017. Bo, Zhiyue. “China’s Design of Global Governance: The Role of Africa.” In China and the European Union in Africa: Partners or Competitors? Edited by Benjamin Barton and Jing Men. Burlington: Ashgate, 2011. Bodman, Samuel W., Julia Sweig and James D. Wolfensohn. Global Brazil and U.S.–Brazil Relations. New York: CFR, 2011. Bristow, Mike, Bert N. Adams and Cecil Pereira. “Ugandan Asians in Britain, Canada, and India: Some characteristics and resources.” Journal of Ethnic and Migration Studies, Vol. 4, No. 2 (1975): 155–166. https://doi.org/10. 1080/1369183X.1975.9975352. Broich, John. Squadron: Ending the African Slave Trade. New York: Overlook Duckworth, 2017. Campbell, Horace. Global NATO and the Catastrophic Failure in Libya: Lessons for Africa in the Forging of African Unity. New York: Monthly Review Press, 2013. Canney, Donald L. Africa Squadron: The U.S. Navy and the Slave Trade. 1842– 1861. South Yorkshire: Pen & Sword Maritime, 2007. Chaponnière, Jean-Raphaël. “Chinese Aid to Africa, Origins, Forms and Issues.” In The New Presence of China in Africa. Edited by Meine Pieter van Dijk. Amsterdam: Amsterdam University Press, 2009. Chivvis, Christopher S. and Jeffrey Martini. Libya After Qaddafi: Lessons and Implications for the Future. Washington, DC: Rand Corp, 2014. Coe, Brooke N. Sovereignty in the South: Intrusive Regionalism in Africa, Latin America, and Southeast Asia. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2019. Connah, Graham. Forgotten Africa: An Introduction to its Archaeology. New York: Routledge, 2004. Cooper, Clayton Sedgwick. The Brazilians and Their Country. London: William Heinemann, 1919. Dal Lago, Enrico. American Slavery, Atlantic Slavery, and Beyond: The U.S. “Peculiar Institution.” In International Perspective. New York: Routledge, 2013. Dallaire, Romeo. Shake Hands with the Devil: The Failure of Humanity in Rwanda. Toronto: Random House, 2004. Daniel, Rosaline and Dawn Nagar. “Africa’s Key Bilateral Relations in Asia: China, India, and Japan.” Centre for Conflict Resolution (2016): 14–18. https://www.jstor.org/stable/resrep05137.8.

8

BETWEEN BRICS’ PROMISE AND PAST WESTERN …

293

Dávila, Jerry. Hotel Trópico: Brazil and the Challenge of African Decolonization, 1950–1980. Durham: Duke University Press, 2010. Davis, David B. The Problem of Slavery in Western Culture. New York: Oxford University Press, 1966. De Mattos, Alessandro Nicoli. Understanding Brazil for Foreigners. Smashwords, 2014. de Souza Neto, Danilo Marcondes. “A Renewed Partnership? Contemporary Latin America–Africa Engagement.” In Africa and the World: Bilateral and Multilateral International Diplomacy. Edited by Dawn Nagar and Charles Mutasa. New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2018. Dessi, Andrea. “The OSCE Mediterranean Partnership, Libya and the MENA Crisis.” In The Search for Stability in Libya: OSCE’s Role Between Internal Obstacles and External Challenges. Edited by Andrea Dessì and Ettore Greco. Roma: Edizioni Nuova Cultura, 2018. Dollar, David. China’s Engagement with Africa: From Natural Resources to Human Resources. Washington, DC: Brookings, 2016. Du Bois, W. E. B. The Suppression of the African Slave Trade to the United States of America 1638–1870. New York: Cosimo Classics, 2007. Duggan, Niall. “China’s Changing Role in Its All-Weather Friendship with Africa.” In China’s International Roles: Challenging or Supporting International Order? Edited by Sebastian Harnisch, Sebastian Bersick and JörnCarsten Gottwald. New York: Routledge, 2016. Edozie, Rita Kiki and Keith Gottschalk. The African Union’s Africa: New Pan-African Initiatives in Global Governance. East Lansing: Michigan State University Press, 2014. Edwards, Bernard. Royal Navy Versus the Slave Traders: Enforcing Abolition at Sea, 1808–1898. Dulles: Potomac Books, 2006. Eisenman, Joshua, and David H. Shinn. China and Africa: A Century of Engagement. Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 2012. EU NAVFOR Somalia, “Mandate.” EU Naval Force-Somalia | Operation ATALANTA. https://eunavfor.eu/mission/. Fayzullina, Karina. “The Arab Spring Through Russian ‘Eyes’.” In Routledge Handbook of the Arab Spring: Rethinking Democratization. Edited by Larbi Sadiki. New York: Routledge, 2015. Feitoza, Pedro. “Historical Trajectories of Protestantism in Brazil. 1810–1960.” In Brazilian Evangelicalism in the Twenty-First Century: An Inside and Outside Look. Edited by Eric Miller and Ronald J. Morgan. New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2019. Freedman. “Robert O. Russia and the Arab Spring.” In The Arab Spring: The Hope and Reality of the Uprising. Edited by David Lesch and Mark L. Haas. Boulder: Westview Press, 2017.

294

S. M. MAGU

Fung, Courtney J. China and Intervention at the UN Security Council: Reconciling Status. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2019. Gathii, James Thuo. African Regional Trade Agreements as Legal Regimes. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2011. Gu, Jing and Richard Carey. “China’s Development Finance and African Infrastructure Development.” In China-Africa and an Economic Transformation. Edited by Arkebe Oqubay and Justin Yifu Lin. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2019. Gunn, Mary and L. E. W. Codd. Botanical Exploration Southern Africa. Cape Town: A. A. Balkema, 1981. Guttery, Ben R. Encyclopedia of African Airlines. Jefferson, NC: McFarland & Company, 1998. Hand, Felicity and Esther Pujolràs-Noguer. “From Cane Cutters and Traders to Citizens and Writers.” In Relations and Networks in South African Indian Writing. Edited by Esther Pujolràs-Noguer and Felicity Hand. Leiden: Brill Rodopi, 2015. Hong, Young-sun. Cold War Germany, the Third World, and the Global Humanitarian Regime. New York: Cambridge University Press, 2013. Huang, Chiung-Chiu and Chih-yu Shih. Harmonious Intervention: China’s Quest for Relational Security. New York: Routledge, 2014. Hughes, Lindsey. Peter the Great: A Biography. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 2004. Husar, Jörg. Framing Foreign Policy in India. Brazil and South Africa: On the Like-Mindedness of the IBSA States. Cham: Springer, 2016. Jain, Ravindra K. Nation, Diaspora, Trans-nation: Reflections from India. London: Routledge, 2010. Jamal, Vali. “Asians in Uganda, 1880–1972: Inequality and Expulsion.” The Economic History Review, New Series, Vol. 29, No. 4 (November, 1976): 602–616. https://www.jstor.org/stable/2595346. Jones, Howard. Mutiny on the Amistad: The Saga of a Slave Revolt and Its Impact on American Abolition. Law and Diplomacy. New York: Oxford University Press, 1987. Kachiga, Jean. China in Africa: Articulating China’s Africa Policy. Trenton: Africa World Press, 2013. Kassim, Yang Razali. The Geopolitics of Intervention: Asia and the Responsibility to Protect. New York: Springer, 2014. Kumar, Satish. “National Security Environment: Developments Pertaining to Asia, Africa and Latin America.” In India’s National Security: Annual Review 2012. Edited by Satish Kumar. New Delhi: Routledge, 2013. Kusimba, Chapurukha M. “Ancient Connections Between China and East Africa.” In China and East Africa: Ancient Ties, Contemporary Flows. Edited

8

BETWEEN BRICS’ PROMISE AND PAST WESTERN …

295

by Chapurukha M. Kusimba, Tiequan Zhu and Purity Wakabari Kiura. Lanham: Lexington Books, 2020. Lall, Marie C. India’s Missed Opportunity: India’s Relationship with the Non Resident Indians. London: Routledge, 2001. Lambert, Jacques. Latin America: Social Structure and Political Institutions, trans. Helen Katel. Berkeley: UC Press, 1967. Lemon, Anthony. “The Political Position of Indians in South Africa.” In South Asians Overseas: Migration and Ethnicity. Edited by Colin Clarke, Ceri Peach and Steven Vertovec. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1990. Lowe, Norman. Mastering Modern World History, 5th ed. London: Palgrave Macmillan, 2013. Madden, Payce. “Figure of the Week: Foreign Direct Investment in Africa.” Africa in Focus. The Brookings Institution (October 9, 2019). https://www.brookings.edu/blog/africa-in-focus/2019/10/09/fig ure-of-the-week-foreign-direct-investment-in-africa/. Makinda, Samuel M., F. Wafula Okumu and David Mickler. The African Union: Addressing the Challenges of Peace, Security, and Governance. New York: Routledge, 2016. Mamdani, Mahmood. “The Uganda Asian Expulsion Twenty Years After.” Economic and Political Weekly, Vol. 28, No. 3/4 (1993): 93–96. https:// www.jstor.org/stable/4399301. Mandelbaum, Michael. Mission Failure: America and the World in the Post-Cold War Era. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2016. Markham, Clements R. A Memoir on the Indian Surveys. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2015. May, Roy and Oliver Furley. African Interventionist States. New York: Routledge, 2001. Mazimhaka, Patrick. “China and Africa: an African view.” In The Morality of China in Africa: The Middle Kingdom and the Dark Continent. Edited by Stephen Chan. New York: Zed Books, 2013. McIntyre, W. David. The Significance of the Commonwealth, 1965–90. New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 1991. Melvern, Linda. Conspiracy to Murder: The Rwandan Genocide. London: Verso, 2004. Middleton, John. African Merchants of the Indian Ocean: Swahili of the East African Coast. Long Grove, IL: Waveland Press, Inc., 2004. Migration Information Programme. Transit Migration in the Russian Federation. Bloomington: IOM, 1994. Modi, Renu. “Indian and Chinese Soft Power in Africa.” In China-Africa Relations in an Era of Great Transformations. Edited by Li Xing and Abdulkadir O. Farah. New York: Routledge, 2016.

296

S. M. MAGU

Morreale, Brittany. “Asian Powers in Africa: Win, Win, Win, Win?” Book Review—Prosperity. https://www.jstor.org/stable/j.ctv1rmjm7.15. Newitt, Malyn. The Braganzas: The Rise and Fall of the Ruling Dynasties of Portugal and Brazil, 1640–1910. London: Reaktion Books, 2019. Njoh, Ambe J. Tradition, Culture and Development in Africa: Historical Lessons for Modern Development Planning. Burlington: Ashgate, 2006. O’Brien, Justin. “General Amin and the Uganda Asians: Doing the Unthinkable.” The Round Table: The Commonwealth Journal of International Affairs, Vol 63, No. 249 (1973): 91–104 https://doi.org/10.1080/003585373084 53064. Ojwang, Dan. Reading Migration and Culture: The World of East African Indian Literature. New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2013. Okoth, Pontian G. USA, India, Africa During and After the Cold War. Nairobi: UON Press, 2010. Omara-Otunnu, Amii. Politics and the Military in Uganda, 1890–1985. New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 1987. Parmar, Maya. Reading Cultural Representations of the Double Diaspora: Britain, East Africa, Gujarat. Cham: Palgrave Macmillan, 2019. Power, Marcus, Giles Mohan and May Tan-Mullins. China’s Resource Diplomacy in Africa: Powering Development? New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2012. Przeworski, Adam, Michael E. Alvarez, José Antonio Cheibub and Fernando Limongi. Democracy and Development: Political Institutions and Well-Being in the World, 1950–1990. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2000. Republic of Kenya. Kenya National Assembly Official Record (Hansard) June 1–July 30, 1965, Vol. V. Nairobi: Government Printer, 1965. Schmidt, Elizabeth. Foreign Intervention in Africa after the Cold War: Sovereignty, Responsibility, and the War on Terror. Athens: Ohio University Press, 2018. Schmidt, Elizabeth. Foreign Intervention in Africa: From the Cold War to the War on Terror. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2013. Scott, Rebecca. “A Note of Introduction.” In The Abolition of Slavery and the Aftermath of Emancipation in Brazil. Edited by Rebecca Scott, et. al. Durham: Duke University Press, 1988. Selcher, Wayne A. “ Brazil–Africa Relations: Third World Alternatives for Development and Security in Brazil.” The International System: The Rise of a Middle Power. Edited by Wayne Selcher. New York: Routledge, 1981. Shawcross, William. Deliver Us From Evil: Peacekeepers, Warlords and a World of Endless Conflict. New York: Simon & Schuster, 2000. Shekhawat, Seema. “India, Africa and the IOR-ARC: Potential for Collaboration.” In South-South Cooperation: Africa on the Centre Stage. Edited by Renu Modi. London: Palgrave, 2011.

8

BETWEEN BRICS’ PROMISE AND PAST WESTERN …

297

Shillington, Kevin. Encyclopedia of African History: Vol. 1, A–G. New York: Fitzory Dearborn, 2005. Signé, Landry. “Vladimir Putin Is Resetting Russia’s Africa Agenda to Counter the US and China.” The Brookings Institution (October 22, 2019). https://www.brookings.edu/opinions/vladimir-putin-is-resetting-rus sias-africa-agenda-to-counter-the-us-and-china/. Sooklal, Anil, Thokozani Simelane and Jaimal Anand. “Introduction.” In Belt and Road Initiative: Alternative Development Path for Africa. Edited by Thokozani Simelane and Lavhelesani R. Managa. Pretoria: AISA, 2018. Sow, Mariama. “Africa in Focus: Figures of the Week: Chinese Investment in Africa.” Africa in Focus—The Brookings Institution (September 6, 2018). https://www.brookings.edu/blog/africa-in-focus/2018/09/06/ figures-of-the-week-chinese-investment-in-africa/. St John, Ronald Bruce. Libya: Continuity and Change. 2nd ed. New York: Routledge, 2015. Stolte, Christiana. Brazil’s Africa Strategy: Role Conception and the Drive for International Status. New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2015. Sunderland, David, Ed., Economic Development of Africa, 1880–1939: Labour and Other Aspects of Development, vol. 5. London: Routledge, 2011. Tallie, T. J. Queering Colonial Natal: Indigeneity and the Violence of Belonging in and the Violence of Belonging in Southern Africa. Minneapolis: The University of Minnesota, 2019. Taylor, Ian. The Forum on China- Africa Cooperation (FOCAC). New York: Routledge, 2011. The Encyclopedia Americana Corporation. The Encyclopedia Americana: A Library of Universal Knowledge, Vol. 21. Albany: A. B. Lyon Company, 1919. Thomas, Hugh. The Slave Trade: The Story of the Atlantic Slave Trade: 1440– 1870. New York: Simon & Schuster, 1997. Trentmann, Frank. “Introduction,” In The Oxford Handbook of the History of Consumption. Edited by Frank Trentmann. Oxford: OUP, 2012. UK House of Lords & European Union Committee. Combating Somali Piracy: The EU’s Naval Operation Atalanta, 12th Report of Session 2009–10. London: Stationery Office Ltd, 2020. United Nations Organization. “United Nations Documents on Piracy: Security Council resolutions on piracy off the coast of Somalia.” UN Oceans & Law of the Sea, updated 5/24/2012. https://www.un.org/Depts/los/piracy/pir acy_documents.htm. United Nations Security Council. “Resolution 1838 (2008)—S/RES/1838 (2008)”, Adopted by the Security Council at its 5987th meeting, on 7 October 2008. New York, NY, 2008.

298

S. M. MAGU

United States Senate Committee on Foreign Relations. Perceptions, Relations Between the United States and the Soviet Union. Washington, DC: U.S. GPO, 1979. van Dijk, Meine Pieter. “The Impact of the Chinese in Other African Countries and Sectors.” In The New Presence of China in Africa. Edited by Meine Pieter van Dijk. Amsterdam: Amsterdam University Press, 2009. Vines, Alex and Elizabeth Sidiropolous. “India Calling,” The World Today, Vol. 64, No. 4 (April, 2008): 26–27. https://www.jstor.org/stable/40478176. Westad, Odd Arne. The Global Cold War: Third World Interventions and the Making of Our Times. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2007. Wills, Mary. Envoys of Abolition: British Naval Officers and the Campaign Against the Slave Trade in West Africa. Liverpool: Liverpool University Press, 2019. Winterbottom, Tom. A Cultural History of Rio de Janeiro after 1889: Glorious Decadence. New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2016. Wondie, Gizachew. China’s Foreign Policy and Its Human Rights Impact in Africa. A Comparative Study of Ethiopia and Uganda. Berlin: Grin Verlag, 2015. Yordanov, Radoslav A. The Soviet Union and the Horn of Africa during the Cold War: Between Ideology and Pragmatism. Lanham: Lexington Books, 2016. Younger, Paul. New Homelands: Hindu Communities in Mauritius, Guyana, Trinidad, South Africa, Fiji and East Africa. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2010.

CHAPTER 9

Africa’s Post-Colonial Foreign Policy: Assessing History, Imagining the Future

Introduction The number, and range of issues that are often considered, attributed to and analyzed under the umbrella of foreign policy are numerous, and are by no means capable of being addressed in one tome. The initial goal of a study such as this is to attempt to examine issues that have been adjudged to be of importance to the Organization of African Unity (OAU), and its successor, the African Union (AU) and their member states, but from a more institutional perspective. This placed the whole enterprise of this volume into a rather unusual position: one of studying issues, decisions, their implementation and outcomes from an unusual source of foreign policy, i.e., an organization, as opposed to the traditional sources of foreign policy, i.e., actors, interests, audiences and elites from inside the state. It is important to restate the differences between foreign and domestic policy and reiterate that these sources are not mutually exclusive. To wit, domestic policy and foreign policy is differentiated thus: “if the primary target lies outside the country’s borders, it is considered foreign policy, even if it has secondary consequences for politics inside the country,”1 and vice versa. Importantly, there are issues outside of 1 Ryan K. Beasley, Juliet Kaarbo and Jeffrey S. Lantis, “The Analysis of Foreign Policy in Comparative Perspective.” In Ryan K. Beasley, Juliet Kaarbo, Jeffrey S. Lantis and Michael

© The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2021 S. M. Magu, Explaining Foreign Policy in Post-Colonial Africa, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-62930-4_9

299

300

S. M. MAGU

the country that impact domestic policy, just as there are issues inside a (different) country that can affect the domestic policy of a country; the spread of COVID-19 is a prime example, in the reactions to infection rates. Likewise, when the Chernobyl nuclear reactor #4 experienced failure and a meltdown in the former Soviet Union in 1986, although it was theoretically a Soviet domestic issue, the radioactivity that was blown into Eastern Europe and into Scandinavia made it a domestic issue with foreign origins. Many other issues follow similar trajectory, particularly in Africa: Kenya has hosted some of the world’s biggest refugee camps at Dadaab and Kakuma, as a result of the drought and Somali state failure, while Tanzania, Burundi and the Congo hosted millions of refugees fleeing the 1994 Rwanda genocide. Foreign policy issues are not just about a country’s economy; they are also about trade, about humanitarian crises and a host of other issues. It is also useful, as Neack suggests, to ‘back up,’ to think of the subject itself, and the commonly held view of foreign policy, that ‘you know it when you see it.’ Hence, positions such as Tanzania’s support for the ANC and other liberation groups fought against apartheid ought to be self-evident; Tanzania, as one of the Frontline States, supported these causes not necessarily because such support was in its own direct interest, but as part of a broader OAU policy position. Yet, Tanzania’s actions had implications both at home and around the continent, and the world. Foreign policy has thus been defined as “a product of the decision of an individual or a group of individuals … as the behavior of states,”2 but also as “intentions, statements, and actions of an actor–often, but not always, a state–directed toward the external world and the response of other actors to these intentions, statements and actions.3 ” Because foreign policy preferences are thought to be influenced by the international system, the societal environment of a nation-state, the governmental setting, the bureaucratic roles played by policy-makers and the individual characteristics of foreign policy elites.4 It is the case then that some positions invite T. Snarr, Eds., Foreign Policy in Comparative Perspective: Domestic and International Influences on State Behavior, 1st ed. (Thousand Oaks: CQ Press, 2013), 3. 2 Laura Neack, The New Foreign Policy: U.S. and Comparative Foreign Policy in the 21st Century (Lanham, MD: Rowman & Littlefield Publishers, 2003), 25. 3 Neack, The New Foreign Policy, 26. 4 Brian Schmidt, “Theories of US Foreign Policy.” In Michael Cox and Doug Stokes,

Eds., US Foreign Policy, 2nd ed. (New York: Oxford University Press, 2012).

9

AFRICA’S POST-COLONIAL FOREIGN POLICY …

301

such levels of consensus that rationale is not necessary; that the Rwanda genocide, or the holocaust during World War II were an abomination are unlikely to find credible dispute. Therefore, it is unlikely that Nyerere, with his ujamaa philosophy, may have needed to explain support for ANC to the ndugu. O/AU Foreign Policy: Africa’s Preferences, Parsed The task of analyzing foreign policy actions is all the more complex when approached from an institutional and continental perspective. Granted, one might assume that some of the foreign policy preferences were similar across all the countries in Africa—all African countries were opposed to minority rule and the apartheid-like conditions in Rhodesia and in South Africa, even when they disagreed on the approach that would best bring to an end these conditions. For newly independent Third World Countries, the condemnation of apartheid was full throttle, but that of the international system was more nuanced. This was evident through the continuation of trade with the apartheid regime, support of Israel, which supported South Africa which in turn supported Rhodesia and supported the Portuguese, a NATO member state, in its Angola against the independence movements combined the international system, governmental setting and the societal conditions in these particular states, in a way that allowed for the generalization and analysis of foreign policy from an African institutional perspective. There were characteristics germane to the leaders of newly independent African nations that favored antiapartheid movements and dedication to the end of apartheid. Most African leaders were compatriots of luminaries such as Mandela, Oliver Tambo and Walter Sisulu; they had been activists in the Pan-Africanist Movement and other pro-liberation movements. Others had suffered the same fates—imprisonment, as was the case with Jomo Kenyatta—and their understanding of the inherent deprivation of rights by colonial governments united the leaders, soon-to-be presidents. But besides that, the abhorrent nature of colonialism and apartheid unified not only African leaders, but also human rights activists and anti-imperialists around the world. The study of Africa’s foreign policy is therefore possible within the realm of certain, not all, issues. A further benefit of the institutional foreign policy study approach is that more than anywhere, Africa’s battles

302

S. M. MAGU

have largely been fought in blocs; the issues Africa experienced lent themselves better to resolution through group and consensus actions. With Rhodesia’s UDI and South Africa’s apartheid rule, the active support of anti-regime groups challenged the very existence of those regimes. While the likelihood that South Africa would eventually abandon the apartheid regime, and Rhodesia would open up to include the majority as other former British colonies had done might have been a matter of time, the shaming of the regimes, of activities they took part in, or those states that collaborated with them, and the near-solid boycotts likely hastened the fall of the regimes. Especially in these cases, and in other issues such as states’ borders, the defense and respect of sovereignty were issues better tackled as a continental bloc. Other issues lent themselves to the same approach: the representation in the UN’s major organs (other than the Security Council—where Africa has 3 non-permanent seats), or ECOSOC, where Africa has the highest number of seats (14, but perhaps illustrative of how unimportant Africa is), and the location of a number of UN Funds in Africa such as UNEP and UN Habitat—were concessions best reached through exertion of influence as a bloc, rather than individual countries. ‘Groupthink’ and joint action among African countries—through the OAU, AU or the UN—have been beneficial in some instances, but the same approach has impeded any reforms that Africa might have hoped to accomplish in any substantive ways. African institutions and groups have mostly operated on the premise of inclusion and geography. The OAU and AU have always existed as communities of geography, not of choice as is the case with the ECSC-EEC-EU. While exclusion marked Africa’s interactions with the international system until about 1960, the predictable pendulum swing to the complete opposite, i.e., automatic inclusion, the outcome is that there are few, if any costs, to members who violate the sacrosanct principles of the organization(s). Notably, there is a contention between official rhetoric and reality, in actions and reactions of the OAU and its successor. In particular, the tension between absolute, indivisible sovereignty pitted against versus coup d’états. On the one hand, the OAU holds sacrosanct the principle of absolute sovereignty, and shuns intervention in the internal affairs of its member states. In Sierra Leone in 1996, after the overthrow of Ahmad Tejan Kabbah’s democratically elected government by low-level military leaders of the Revolutionary United Front (RUF), the UN, OAU, ECOWAS, EU and the Commonwealth condemned the coup, and the Nigerian

9

AFRICA’S POST-COLONIAL FOREIGN POLICY …

303

government, with the blessing of ECOWAS/ECOMOG, initiated a lowintensity conflict to oust the military rebel leaders, while ECOWAS placed an embargo on oil, arms and weapons, while at the same time deploying military forces and urge restoration of the Kabbah government.5 Other interventions were to be seen, and not quite condemned. One of the most glaring, recent examples of a ‘not a coup d’état’ change in government—one that introduced stratospheric levels of moral conundrum on whether Mugabe leaving power by means of a ‘not a coup d’état’ could be cheered, or at most, not be condemned, was the November 15, 2017 ‘change in leadership’ in Zimbabwe. The increasing societal tensions from inflation to the idea of Zimbabwe = Mugabe—in addition to other reasons—stemmed most immediately from the progressive elevation of Zimbabwe’s First Lady Grace Mugabe, up the party leadership, soon to become the vice-president with potential to succeed her husband. It was seen as an attempt to impose a dynastic rule (37 years) in the event of the 93-year-old president’s departure.6 There was a glaring lack of condemnation of the ‘situation’ by African leaders and the OAU, choosing the more acceptable term for the change of government. The military in Zimbabwe was instrumental in removing Mugabe from power as Zimbabweans demonstrated in major cities, and when the military was commanded by this venerated freedom fighter, it refused orders to quell the protests, much as was the case with the Arab Spring uprisings. Apologists for why it was not a coup pointed to the rather unusual circumstances: there were ‘negotiations’ for Mugabe to leave power and go into exile—decidedly not a favorite tactic of coup plotters; ultimately, Mugabe ‘was stepped down.’ Everyone danced around the issue of what was military action sporting all the ingredients of a military coup, although no world leader called it that. They called it a ‘military intervention.’7 There was rapid rapprochement with all 5 David Wippman, “Pro-democratic Intervention by Invitation.” In Gregory H. Fox and Brad R. Roth, Eds., Democratic Governance and International Law (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2000). 6 Takavafira Masarira Zhou, “Governance, Democratisation and Development in PostMugabe Zimbabwe.” In Fidelis Peter Thomas Duri, Ngonidzashe Marongwe and Munyaradzi Mawere, Eds., Mugabeism after Mugabe? Rethinking Legacies and the New Dispensation in Zimbabwe’s ‘Second Republic’ (Masvingo: Africa Talent Publishers PVT, 2019). 7 Farai Maguwu and Shakespear Hamauswa, “BRICS and the New Scramble for Zimbabwe in the Aftermath of the Military Coup.” In Justin van der Merwe and Patrick

304

S. M. MAGU

and sundry, including the UK. More importantly, the new president, Emmerson Mnangagwa, was welcomed around the world, attending a World Economic Forum meeting in Davos, Switzerland two months after coming to power, attending AU Assemblies and addressed the 74th Session of the United Nations General Assembly (general debate) on September 25, 2019. Another instance of the ‘not-coup-coup’—although this one perhaps —was carried out in April 2019 against Sudan’s president, Omar Hassan Ahmed el-Bashir, Sudan’s ruler for almost 39 years. Given that he has been on the ICC’s radar for almost a decade, has presided over ruinous conflicts and the split of Sudan, and that he was not a darling of the neoliberal world order, there was not much grief over his ouster. Indeed, more and more, it appears that ‘negotiating’ African leaders out of power with the threat of the military hanging over the proceeds has caught on—understandably, because—Gaddafi. There is precedent for accepting the ‘new’ leaders as representatives of their countries at international and regional organizations; this is not just limited to Africa. While the tension between sovereignty and intervention continues, even in countries where misery reigns, a la Zimbabwe and Sudan, accepting these leaders at meetings of global organizations has a long history—with good reason. IT is estimated that Africa has seen more than 200 coups attempts, with about 80 of them succeeding. Still, African countries impose no costs to countries that experience these illegal transfers of power. At the same time, there have been countries that were actively seeking changes in other countries’ governments in nefarious ways. It is plausible too, that because African leaders know that the OAU and its successor, the AU, have no enforcement mechanisms for their rules, the lack of significant pushback creates impunity. It is also true that a healthy number of African leaders came to power through military coups. Indeed, the intervention in Sierra Leone under Nigeria’s military forces was not devoid of irony: Sani Abacha had come to power by deposing his predecessor. More importantly, it is perhaps useful to divide issues OAU, AU and broadly, Africa, has grappled with from a continental perspective as was done previously. There are other issues that may not quite make it to the agenda of the OAU, either because they are not continent-wide, or because Africa is not necessarily involved, or affected, by these issues. Bond, Eds., BRICS and Resistance in Africa: Contention, Assimilation and Co-optation (London: Zed Books, 2019), 121.

9

AFRICA’S POST-COLONIAL FOREIGN POLICY …

305

One wonders what the position of the AU is, on the issue of nuclear weapons, or the question of deployment of weapons in space—or the moon. Some issues are so far removed that only those countries directly involved, or affected, might have a position thereof. The more critical issues revolve around less—celestial—issues, for example the question of the relevance of AU to Africans, AU’s position on issues of governance, democracy, human rights, humanitarian intervention, terrorism, the issue of post-colonial settlements and reparations, as was the case in Kenya. There are questions of corruption and its effect on interstate relations especially in the age of terrorism. The African Diaspora has been a source of remittances that impact countries’ economies—does the AU have a position on such issues? There are questions on global institutions and Africa’s representation. For its near 20 percent of the world’s population and fully 25 percent of the member states of the UN, Africa is not represented in the UN Security Council—but neither is India, whose population exceeds Africa’s. Other issues of interest include Africa’s position on climate change—which has been affecting Africa disproportionately. AU unveiled Agenda 2063, a century after its founding; it is thus useful to examine such issues in the context of the AU. OAU/AU Dispersed Foreign Policy Issues of Note Besides these continent-wide issues, there are other issues that affect the continent, in different ways, often depending on geography, climate, religion, ethnicity or proximity to issues germane to a region. For example, NATO has an ongoing collaboration program and increase in support for the Group of Five for the Sahel (G5 Sahel), formed in 2014 in Nouakchott, Mauritania, by the host, together with Burkina Faso, Chad, Mali and Niger,8 and where France has had an ongoing military mission to quell the separatist violence by the National Movement for the Liberation of Azawad (MNLA),9 and where France hopes for more intervention by other NATO members. At the same time, NATO, given the dual membership of some of its members in NATO and EU, has had to carry out law enforcement and just as regularly, humanitarian rescue missions 8 Eloïse Bertrand and Nic Cheeseman, “Understanding the G5: Governance, Development and Security in the Sahel, NATO Allied Command Transformation (ACT) OPEN Publications, vol. 3, no. 2, spring 2019. 9 Bertrand and Cheeseman, “Understanding the G5,” 2019.

306

S. M. MAGU

for overcrowded and capsizing boats plying their trade in the Mediterranean Sea,10 with refugees fleeing various types of violence through North Africa—whether it’s the conflict in Libya and Somalia, poverty in Chad, Eritrea and Ethiopia, or the dual conflict-poverty issues in such countries as Niger, Mali, Burkina Faso, Nigeria, Congo, CongoBrazzaville and parts of Cameroon. These issues are unlikely to directly affect countries that are, for example, in the southern parts of the African continent and may not necessarily warrant AU actions. It is therefore useful to consider some of the issues with more general implications for the continent, some which have received significant attention, while some, even as they occur and have significant impact on Africa—for example, climate change—have not been at the forefront of OAU/AU actions. State Fragility, State Failure and the Rise of Violent Non-State Actors Somalia, its complex history and some of its recent challenges have been discussed elsewhere, but it is in the context of state failure that this section revisits the troubled nation. Whether or not Somalia’s colonial experiences and its division into three distinct regions each administered by a different European power, or its attempts at integration into one nation after independence, or even the subsequent attempts at accomplishing the project for the Greater Somalia in unsuccessful wars with Ethiopia, Djibouti and Kenya, the Horn has been one of those troublesome spots in Africa’s history. What compounds Somalia’s situation is that its neighbor, Ethiopia, has been the center of African affairs, Egypt to the north is thought of as the cultural center of the Arab world, while countries like Kenya and Tanzania to the south have enjoyed mostly prolonged periods of peace and prosperity, serving as Africa’s gateway to the Arabian peninsula and Southeast Asia through history, while serving as a bastion of pro-western ideological and commercial interests. But Somalia has been a perennial challenge. This was especially the case after the fall of the government of Mohammed Siad Barre in 1991, and the progressive disintegration of the nation, the declaration of independence

10 Douglas Herbert, “NATO Chief ‘Optimistic’ That Allies Will Support France in Sahel Region.” The Interview, Modified: November 29, 2019. https://www.france24. com/en/africa/20191129-interview-nato-chief-stoltenberg-optimistic-allies-will-supportfrance-sahel-france-macron-french-military-mali-operation-barkhane.

9

AFRICA’S POST-COLONIAL FOREIGN POLICY …

307

by the Republic of Somaliland in 1992,11 a devastating drought followed by a most destructive famine that led to the famous ‘black hawk down’ episode. Although the world didn’t quite know it then, a new era had arrived—not just of the short-lived US hegemonic reign, but that of state failure. Somalia’s state failure, a condition that reached an unprecedented 3rd decade, started out as a civil war that, between the resulting famine and the conflict, killed over 400,000. Preponderant US power, the absence of a contender and images of armed militia riding in open pick-up vehicles interspersed with the horror of starving children and displaced families meant that the approval of UN Security Council resolution 751 (1992) in April 1992, intended to monitor a cease-fire and introduce peacekeeping troops under the UNOSOM I mission was approved. Prior to the authorization of UNOSOM I, negotiations between the major factions in Somalia were supported by the OAU, the League of Arab States (LAS) and the Organization of the Islamic Conference (OIC), including sending representatives to the UN for a December 1991 ceasefire negotiation. UNOSOM transitioned into the Unified Task Force (UNITAF) in December 1992, its mandate not only to keep the peace, but to also deliver humanitarian assistance. Among the African states that contributed military forces to UNITAF were Botswana, Egypt, Morocco, Nigeria, Tunisia and Zimbabwe, a demonstration of the high levels of commitment to the mission. Meetings at UNECA Headquarters in Ethiopia, involving the UN, ECA, LAS, OAU, OIC, NAM, and the Chairman of the Standing Committee of the Countries of the Horn were involved in negotiations to establish permanent peace. Ultimately, UNITAF would transition to UNOSOM II, established in March 1993, with an increase of troops to 37,000.12 Although UNOSOM II’s deployment terminated in March 1995, this in no way suggested that Somalia was ready to resume its place among the sovereign nations. Indeed, the challenges were about to become worse, both for the country and international shipping.

11 Robert Oakley, “America’s Security Role: The Horn of Africa.” In Patrick M. Cronin, Ed., Global Strategic Assessment 2009: America’s Security Role in a Changing World (Washington, DC: National Defense University Press, 2009). 12 UN Department of Peacekeeping Operations, “Somalia—UNOSOM I: Background,” DPKO. Available from https://peacekeeping.un.org/mission/past/unosom1ba ckgr2.html.

308

S. M. MAGU

Although the intervention in Somalia had some blessing from the OAU, the OAU in no way abandoned its commitment to the principle of non-intervention in the internal affairs of member states, no matter how limiting such a policy was. “Maintenance of the non-intervention principle regardless of internal conditions severely restricted the OAU’s ability to engage in many conflict resolution activities, particularly in the case of civil wars.”13 This was even more noticeable as the low-intensity conflicts all over the African continent, previously fairly well managed by a bipolar world disorder, erupted into full-throttle civil wars. “The immediate postCold War period became one of the darkest, bloodiest and bleakest of times for Africa […] from Liberia to Sierra Leone, From Somalia to Rwanda, OAU member states were ‘disintegrating individually,’”14 while the OAU adopted an ostrich-head-in-the-sand posture and refused to recognize new realities, the US, burned by Somalia and the failure in Rwanda, while NATO and the European Union were preoccupied with the conflagration of the former Yugoslavia. Indeed, the failure of the Weberian state as conceived in Africa was happening in the most spectacular fashion, and in a post-Cold War environment, there was little in the way of a pre-existing rule-book, or solutions to this new phenomenon. Of special importance was the realization that even though the world was unwilling to intervene to stop state failure, even temporarily, interested parties would not hesitate to intervene when they perceived that their interests, directly or indirectly, were threatened. For the US, the 9/11 attacks heightened the issue of terrorism, and made intervention the first option, notwithstanding OAU/AU’s hurt feelings—or those of any other parties—the poster-child here was Iraq. As previously discussed, the US was involved in EU–NAVFOR’s Operation ATALANTA, including the now-Tom Hanks famous Captain Phillips rescue; yet the progress and territorial gains made by the Islamic Courts Union (ICU), a militant group in Somalia with the wherewithal to defeat the patchwork of warlords and the EU, UN, AU, Arab. League, everybody-supported, 13 P. Godfrey Okoth, “Conflict Resolution in Africa: The Role of the OAU & the AU.” In Alfred G. Nhema and Paul Tiyambe Zeleza, Eds., The Resolution of African Conflicts: The Management of Conflict Resolution & Post-Conflict Reconstruction (Oxford: James Currey, 2008), 23. 14 Solomon Dersso, “African Foreign Policy Making in the African Union: Peace and Security.” In Francis Onditi, Gilad Ben-Nun, Cristina D’Alessandro and Zack Levey, Eds., Contemporary Africa and the Foreseeable World Order (Lanham: Lexington Books, 2019), 350.

9

AFRICA’S POST-COLONIAL FOREIGN POLICY …

309

Nairobi-located Transitional Federal Government (TFG) to create a fundamentalist state with sympathies to violent non-state actors, or terrorists, the US was alarmed and quickly forgot Black Hawk Down. In 2006, the ICU overreaching into Ogaden “caused the Ethiopian army– supported with considerable U.S. assistance including two airstrikes – to move into Somalia […] it quickly routed the ICU militias…”15 To date, the US continues to carry out missions in Somalia, some of which are launched from US-Kenyan bases on Kenya’s territory, although the murkiness and the dearth of information to the public often makes such activities known only when there are unintended consequences, attacks or other unusual events—such as the recent Al Shabaab attack on a Kenyan base at the coast of Kenya, in which US troops were targeted. Most scholars acknowledge the ethnic dimensions of conflict in Africa, and in many instances where states ‘fail’ other than in Somalia, the failure can be attributed to some element of ethnicity that is built on different foundations: political parties are formed along ethnic lines, government is often dominated by certain ethnic groups and conflict’s fissures often reflect these divisions.16 Even as they have failed (and Africa’s states top every list, every criteria of state failure), the most common reaction to a failed state is to reconstruct it, rather than completely abrogate its existence, even when it is recognized that state failure implies the inability to carry out the functions expected of a state.17 Perhaps that is because, like George Orwell hypothesized, all states do not fail the same way, neither do they stay failed, and indeed Iqbal and Starr note the different amounts of time states stay failed—in total, their findings show 120 years of state failure of 27 states;18 therefore, considering Rwanda in this context, state failure is reversible. AU’s determination not to intervene even in failed states often supersedes the need to reconstruct states to fulfill their obligations under the ‘responsibility to protect’ doctrine. But in 2006, the IGASOM (IGAD Support Mission to Somalia) was authorized, followed by AMISOM (AU Mission to Somalia), which has continued to have 15 Oakley, “America’s Security Role,” 2009, 312. 16 Richard H. Shultz Jr. and Andrea J. Dew, Insurgents, Terrorists, and Militias: The

Warriors of Contemporary Combat (New York: Columbia University Press, 2006). 17 Serge Sur, International Law, Power, Security and Justice: Essays on International Law and Relations (Oxford: Hart Publishing, 2010). 18 Zaryab Iqbal and Harvey Starr, State Failure in the Modern World (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 2016).

310

S. M. MAGU

backing and authorization through the UN Security Council Resolution 2372(2017) AMISOM.19 Regional (IGAD) and continental (AU) intervention in a failed state was more of an outlier than the norm; majority of interventions to date have been carried out by the UN, NATO and the US.20 Intervention to reconstruct states has often produced undesirable outcomes, no matter the good intentions of the Responsibility to Protect (R2P) doctrine. While everyone might sympathize with the plight of Libyan civilians who were protesting 42 years of leadership by Muammar Gaddafi and were fired upon—the AU certainly did, and condemned the use of violence on civilians21 —the outcome of NATO’s intervention in Libya to enforce a no-fly zone almost confirmed the prophecy that Libya would disintegrate into another failed state, just as Iraq, Afghanistan, Yemen and other countries had, following some type of intervention. The position of the AU was also surprising, given that Gaddafi, instrumental in strong-arming Africa into the AU, was elected AU president in 2009.22 But some consider this to be an inevitable development, indeed a new trajectory in AU’s approach to issues that impact member countries, based on the 2002 AU Charter adoption and the key premise of ICISS’ Responsibility to Protect doctrine, adopted by the UN. The latter saw AU intervention in Comoros, Kenya, Mali, Cote d’Ivoire, Mauritania and Zimbabwe. Indeed, the actions taken in these disparate situations resolving post-election violence, peacemaking, implementation of electoral outcomes and taking leadership on issues of importance to Africa have given the AU legitimacy, even when the past has been marked by inaction (Rwanda) or being on the wrong side of history, at least initially

19 Jude Cocodia, Peacekeeping and the African Union: Building Negative Peace (New York: Routledge, 2018). 20 Patrick M. Regan, “Interventions into Civil Wars: literature, Contemporary Policy, and Future Research.” In Edward Newman and Karl DeRouen, Jr., Eds., Routledge Handbook of Civil Wars, (New York: Routledge, 2014). 21 Christopher M. Blanchard, Libya: Unrest and U.S. Policy, (Washington, DC: Congressional Research Service, 2011). 22 Blanchard, Libya, 2011.

9

AFRICA’S POST-COLONIAL FOREIGN POLICY …

311

(Libya); with Kenya and Zimbabwe, the AU showed successful future interventionism.23 On Terrorism The connection between conflict and terrorism made, more often than not by nations other than those in Africa. It is the case that some of the nefarious actors, by their pronouncements or affiliations, often fit the definition of terrorists. The designation becomes troublesome, considering that the label was quite liberally plastered on all manner of African independence leaders—Kenyatta, Mandela, Mugabe—and so often, the maxim that ‘if he is ours, he is a freedom fighter’ and ‘if he is theirs, he is a terrorist’ often holds. Broadly, the OAU and the AU have been reticent in labeling actors terrorists yet the body has signed onto, and lived up to its commitments on legislation, treaties, organizations and frameworks of decreasing and eliminating the work and support by terrorist organizations and persons. For example, long before the twin attacks of 9/11 that really shone the light on terrorism, Kenya and Tanzania had experienced terrorist attacks, carried out by Al Qaeda and targeting US embassies in both countries in 1998, with monumental destruction of life and facilities. Two years earlier, Ethiopian Airlines Flight 961 was hijacked between Addis Ababa and Nairobi, the hijackers demanding asylum in Australia, before ditching near Grande Comore, Comoros. In 1994, Air France Flight 8969 was hijacked in December 1994 by the Armed Islamic Group of Algeria—in the aftermath of a military takeover and annulment of elections which the Islamic Salvation Front (FIS) was poised to win, with the plane ending up in Marseilles and stormed by French commandos. Almost two decades before was the most famous hijacking/terrorist incident, when Air France Flight 139 from Tel Aviv to Paris was diverted to Libya and then Uganda, and later stormed to free the hostages. These, for all intents and purposes, appeared to be hijackings by specific militant groups (terrorist incidents) with rather far-fetched causes that most Africans could not quite identify with, for example the situation between Israel and Palestine. The phenomenon of state supporters of terrorism brought about a new, frightening dimension; whatever the motivations for Uganda and Libya were, most African countries steered 23 Thomas Kwasi Tieku, “The African Union.” In Jane Boulden, Ed., Responding to Conflict in Africa: The United nations and Regional Organizations (New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2013).

312

S. M. MAGU

clear of these elements of sponsoring terrorist movements. Perhaps with good reason: Operation Entebbe demonstrated that a country could incur the wrath of a more militarily capable country at whim, as did the Air France Flight 8969. On the other hand, in considering the duality of the conditions of state failure and harbor (and actions) by violent non-state actors, i.e., terrorists, Africa has seen a rise in these instances and actors— from Islamic Courts Union, to Al-Shabaab, Al Qaeda in the Maghreb (AQIM), Boko Haram, their affiliations with the Islamic State, and the less fundamentalist oriented groups, such as the Lord’s Resistance Army in Uganda and M-23 in the Congo. The AU’s responses on terrorism can be quite confounding, based on its actions (or no actions). In 1997, Sudan was accused of harboring and supporting terrorists, through funding and providing safe haven for terrorists. Granted, there were other unrelated accusations, for example, human rights violations relating to the future state of South Sudan and the Darfur region. Even as it was being accused of these ‘crimes,’ in 1996, it expelled Osama Bin Laden, who had been accused of being a mastermind of the first Twin Towers bombing in February 1993. Most of the countries in the Horn of Africa, with whom Sudan had rather chilly relations, suspended diplomatic relations with the country. Following the US attack on Sudan with cruise missiles as a response to the Kenya/Tanzania US embassy bombings, Sudan denied any responsibility or connection to the terrorists, pointing to the fact of having expelled Osama. But Sudan’s woes went deeper; it had been accused of harboring individuals accused of attempting to assassinate then-Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak in Ethiopia in 1995, and had declared a holy war (jihad) against Ethiopia in 1997. Sudan did back down: in 2000, “Sudan had signed all 12 international conventions for combating terrorism.”24 At the same time, after the 1998 retaliatory attack, Sudan appealed to the UNSC for a fact-finding mission to establish whether, in fact, the bombed plant had produced chemical weapons; “the draft resolution was supported by the Arab states and the OAU but was blocked by the US.”25

24 Edmund Jan Osmanczyk and Edmund Jan Osmanczyk, ´ (ed.), Encyclopedia of the United Nations and International Agreements: A to F, 3rd Edition, Volume 3: N –S (New York: Routledge, 2003), 2256. 25 Myra Williamson, Terrorism, War and International Law: The Legality of the Use of Force Against Afghanistan in 2001 (New York: Ashgate Publishing, 2009), 141.

9

AFRICA’S POST-COLONIAL FOREIGN POLICY …

313

There were also the other kind of terrorist events that more closely suggested they were ‘crimes against humanity,’ committed as war atrocities to put fear into the citizenry; the use of child soldiers by Joseph Kony and the Lord’s Resistance Army, or the conflict in Sierra Leone where non-combatants’ hands were slashed, were more of this variety. In the second decade of the twenty-first century, a different phenomenon arose; one that frighteningly combined terrorist groups with territorial conquest: the Mali rump state created by groups affiliated with AQIM, or Boko Haram, where they use both the coercive tactics but also pair them with administrative practices such as tax collections have become more menacing. This latter phenomenon has been more apparent in the failed, failing and fragile states, in ways that allow terrorists to find relatively safe space, as was seen in Pakistan with regard to Osama bin Laden. Here, the challenges to Africa’s capabilities show: despite globally ‘viral’ Kony 2012 documentary, or the worldwide hashtag #bringbackourgirls, not much happened to resolve these two issues, and it is therefore understandable when (now the) AU does not articulate a position on drone and targeted cruise missile airstrikes to eliminate terrorists who might carry out such activities, especially if the government has insufficient control over their territories to facilitate their capture and denial of territory. The AU and its predecessor, the OAU, have undertaken actions related to combating terrorism and related issues. These include, as far back as 1992 under OAU, adoption of AHG/Res.213 (XXVIII), a Resolution on the Strengthening of Cooperation and Coordination among African States26 to fight terrorism and extremism. Two years later, in Tunis, the ordinary Session adopted AHG/Del.2 (XXX), the Declaration on the Code of Conduct for Inter-African Relations27 ; this resolution built on the previous resolution, rejecting extremism and terrorism under the guises of sectarianism, tribalism, ethnicity or religion. In 1999, the OAU Convention on the Prevention and Combating of Terrorism28 was adopted in Algiers, with current ratification at 40 members. Shortly after the terrorist attacks on the US in September 2001, legislation on harboring, financing, movement and other elements of stopping terrorist 26 The African Union, “The African Union Counter Terrorism Framework,” Divisions— African Union Peace and Security, Updated 23 November 2015. Available from http:// www.peaceau.org/en/page/64-counter-terrorism-ct. 27 African Union, “The African Union Counter Terrorism Framework,” (2015). 28 African Union, “The African Union Counter Terrorism Framework,” (2015).

314

S. M. MAGU

attacks gained traction in countries and international organizations. The AU adopted the Dakar Declaration Against Terrorism29 on October 17, 2001. The framework acknowledged other issues intertwined with terrorism: drug trafficking, transnational crimes, money laundering and weapons proliferation. Following, in 2002, representatives of African nations adopted the AU Plan of Action on the Prevention and Combating of Terrorism30 followed by the establishment of the African Centre for the Study and Research on Terrorism (ACSRT) whose director doubles up as the AU Special Representative for Counter-Terrorism Cooperation.31 The last major action was the drafting of the African Model Law on Counter Terrorism in 2011, adopted as Assembly/AU/Dec.369 (XVII).32 Legislation and cooperation between countries, regions and organizations to rein in terrorism is important, and its importance has only grown over the past quarter century as more sophistication to transport, targets and ease of access has increased. Globalization and the Internet have made it much easier to recruit from afar, but also made available unregulated content that has the potential to indoctrinate youth without detection. Terrorism has become truly a transnational issue, and terrorist incidents now do not only target western interests in African countries which tend to be less well protected. As has been repeatedly demonstrated, African countries and their interests have seen an increase in targeting, either for collaborating with ‘infidels’ or to make political points or support affiliated groups, as has happened with the Kenyan Mombasa Republican Council (MRC). As the targets have increased and proliferated, terrorists’ methods also change, and adapt frequently. Boko Haram‘s notoriety in forcibly strapping suicide vests to young girls and blowing them up in markets, the increasing incidents of improvised explosive devices (IEDs) targeting AMISOM troops have been reported. Other groups, such as the Movement for the Emancipation of the Niger Delta (MEND), have resorted to kidnapping oil workers. In Libya, militant groups often described as terrorists have engaged in every kind of vice: from human trafficking to weapons sales, kidnappings to organ sales,

29 African Union, “The African Union Counter Terrorism 30 African Union, “The African Union Counter Terrorism 31 African Union, “The African Union Counter Terrorism 32 African Union, “The African Union Counter Terrorism

Framework,” (2015). Framework,” (2015). Framework,” (2015) Framework,” (2015).

9

AFRICA’S POST-COLONIAL FOREIGN POLICY …

315

everything goes. In Mogadishu itself, where conflict has spanned generations, successive Somali governments have seen political assassinations, roadside bombs, truck bombs and even the use of Man-portable airdefense systems (MANPADS) has increased, with highly consequential outcomes. Neighboring countries have not been spared—even countries that are not easily, or directly accessible. A number of terrorist attacks have also been quite symbolic. In 2010, Al Shabab-affiliated suicide bombers, in Kampala, Uganda, attacked a FIFA World Cup football watch party at the Ethiopian Village and Kyadondo Rugby Club.33 At the time, Uganda had a significant presence of peacekeepers in Somalia under the AMISOM mission; the attack did not change Uganda’s commitment to continuing participation in the mission. Other attacks especially in Somalia have included direct attacks on peacekeepers and military camps (e.g., early 2019 in El Adde, where an estimated 300 Kenyan troops were thought to have been killed), to armed, multi-hour attacks at Garissa University in Kenya, the Westgate Mall, and cases of grenades being thrown into crowds in cities and thoroughfares, the low-intensity attacks have increased as AMISOM’s mission continues in Somalia, while in countries such as Nigeria, Boko Haram‘s tactics and attacks, and their fealty to Al Shabaab, have been especially lethal.34 Interestingly, Al Shabaab, who have often procured funding and support from the US, have also called for attacks on the Mall of America in Minneapolis—rather unwisely, as that often invites a drone strike.35 The goals, growth, affiliations, tactics and outcomes of these terrorist groups are nefarious enough to warrant concerted joint actions to make a dent in their recruitment and influence, particularly on desperate youth eager to make money any which way.

33 Kris Inman, “The Legacy of Exile: Terrorism in and Outside Africa from Osama Bin Laden to Al-Shabaab.” In Benjamin N. Lawrence and Nathan Riley Carpenter, Eds., Africans in Exile: Mobility, Law, and Identity (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 2018). 34 Richard Warnes, “Al Shabaab.” In Colin P. Clarke, Terrorism: The Essential Reference Guide (Santa Barbara: ABC-Clio, 2018). 35 Michael McCaul, Failures of Imagination: The Deadliest Threats to Our Homeland-and How to Thwart Them (New York: Crown Forum, 2016).

316

S. M. MAGU

O/AU and Climate Change: Implications for a Changing—Warming Planet Although the environment has been one of Africa’s less obviously important issues—at least from an OAU and AU perspective, given such issues as liberation and economic development, but the twin issues of environmental stewardship and climate change have been of special importance to the continent. The first of these important actions was the 1964 adoption of a ‘Declaration on the Denuclearization of Africa’; this was important, given that in the subsequent years, South Africa successfully developed up to 6 nuclear warheads. It was supplemented by the 1996 Treaty of Pelindaba, with the stewardship of IAEA, which established the African continent and islands considered to be in Africa, as an Africa Nuclear Weapons Free Zone, to include nuclear weapons testing.36 The convention was ‘drafted on the recommendation of the OAU’37 reflecting both the importance and global, IGO actions on protection of certain areas of the planet, such as the 1959 Antarctic Treaty. The 1968 adoption of the African Convention on the Conservation of Nature and Natural Resources urged all African states to undertake necessary steps to conserve nature for both economic and ecological reasons. Of particular note was its rich diversity of wildlife.38 Beginning in 1996 with input and participation of the IUCN, UNEP and UNECA, the Revised African Convention on the Conservation of Nature and Natural Resources was adopted in 2003 at AU’s second summit.39 The revised version included additional protocols and imposed a ban and outlawed trade especially in endangered wildlife species. Institutionally, the establishment of the United Nations Environmental Programme (UNEP) in 1972 after the Stockholm Conference, the first of a number of major environmental conferences, and the location of

36 Alexandre Kiss and Dinah Shelton, Guide to International Environmental Law (Leiden: Martinus Nijhoff Publishers, 2007). 37 John Scanlon and Françoise Burhenne-Guilmin (eds.), International Environmental

Governance: An International Regime For Protected Areas (IUCN Environmental Policy and Law Paper) (Gland, Switzerland & Cambridge, UK: IUCN, 2004). 38 Kiss and Shelton, Guide to International Environmental Law, 2007. 39 World Conservation Union, An Introduction to the African Convention on the Conser-

vation of Nature and Natural Resources , IUCN Environmental Policy and Law Paper No. 56 Rev., 2nd ed. (IUCN: Bonn, Germany, 2006).

9

AFRICA’S POST-COLONIAL FOREIGN POLICY …

317

its headquarters in Nairobi, Kenya, marked not only a nod to the environment’s importance, but also of the Global South. Arguments abound though, that even as this was the first United Nations Fund or Program to locate its headquarters in the developing world (UN Habitat followed, Nairobi, 1977), UNEP was not vitally important, and further, locating its headquarters in Nairobi only served to marginalize the organization and its functions, since it was not in the major ‘decision-making’ nerve centers of the UN, New York or Geneva.40 In the 1990s, there was, indeed, a concerted effort by developed nations to move the UNEP office from Nairobi to Geneva, efforts adamantly opposed by African— and Global South nations, implying underrepresentation and the Global North nations riding roughshod over the Global South. Notwithstanding, doubts abound, whether UNEP in Nairobi actually serves the interests of developing countries, even as UNEP remains part of the discussions on UN reform,41 although the Global South would much rather discuss Security Council reform. The efficacy and importance of UNEP’s premier environmental agency, in the context of more substantive global agreements such as the Rio ‘92 UNFCCC, the Kyoto Protocol and the Paris Climate accords to which it wasn’t more of a key player than western powers, remains questionable. Environmental issues span more than just global emissions reductions, or a ban on the testing of nuclear weapons. For Africa, climatic and environmental issues extend further, to constructs on merely feeding its rapidly growing population from resources that are quickly approaching carrying capacity. Nowhere else except perhaps for Asia, with a 4.7 billion population (or 60% of the world population), of whom an estimated 58% works in agriculture, is climate more likely to have an effect as significant as it does Africa. An estimated 60% of Africa’s current 1.38 billion people, 850 million people, depend on agriculture as their primary economic activity. Africa’s farmers are mostly engaged in small-scale subsistence farming, mostly to feed oneself and family, with the occasional surplus for sale. Besides farming, nomadic pastoralism occurs in its vast arid and 40 Helmut Volger, “UN Office Nairobi.” In Helmut Volger, Ed., A Concise Encyclopedia of the United Nations : Second Revised Edition (Leiden: Martinus Nijhoff Publishers, 2010). 41 Urs P. Thomas, “Environmental Politics, Trade and United Nations Reform.” In Eric Fawcett and Hanna Newcombe, Eds., United Nations Reform: Looking Ahead after Fifty Years (Toronto: Science for Peace, 1995).

318

S. M. MAGU

semi-arid stretches of savannah grasslands just below the Sahara Desert. Animal husbandry, limited in size and scope, on small farms between 1–5 acres, and almost all of these wholly dependent on increasingly irregular rainfall patterns, supplements the vanishingly few, mostly foreign-owned large-scale farms. Poor farming methods, lack of social safety nets, dependence on agriculture to be both the path out of poverty and source of food have implications for agriculture. Yield from small farms, with few productivity enhancement interventions, is inconsistently low and leads to alternating cycles—accompanied by the obligatory images of swollen rivers and flimsy houses swept away in deluges of floods, followed by annual, sometimes periodic, and in recent years, fairly regular multi-year droughts. In study after study, results find that “total net farm revenues resulted from the incomes generated by dryland crops that are rain-fed, irrigated crops and livestock.”42 The study also found that, predictably, “African crop production is sensitive to climate and hotter and drier regions are likely to be affected most. Increases in temperature and decrease in precipitations have a negative impact on the net revenue.”43 Other studies have shown that climate change is an additional negative factor to the challenges that already face smallholder farmers—poor soil quality, market access, costs of inputs, government support—among others constraints.44 African farmers, leaders and citizens likely do not need studies to tell them what is self-evident: rains are failing more often, producing millions of farmers in need of food handouts, imported from the west. There are a number of correlations inferred from Our World in Data, the first of which suggests a link between economic activity (which also correlates with level of a country’s development) and food in/security— ironically, but understandably, given such factors as historic levels of 42 Salvatore di Falco, “Adaptation to Climate Change in Sub-Saharan Agriculture: Assessing the Evidence and Rethinking the Drivers.” In Cyndi Spindell Berck, Peter Berck and Salvatore Di Falco, Eds., Agricultural Adaptation to Climate Change in Africa: Food Security in a Changing Environment (Environment for Development), 1st ed. (New York: Routledge, 2018), 87. 43 Falco, “Adaptation to Climate Change,” 88. 44 Obert Jiri and Paramu Mafongoya, “A Synthesis of Smallholder Farmers’ Adaptation

to Climate Change in Southern Africa: Averting Adaptation Vacuuum.” In Walter Leal Filho, Belay Simane, Jokasha Kalangu, Menas Wuta, Pantaleo Munishi and Kumbirai Musiyiwa, Eds., Climate Change Adaptation in Africa: Fostering Resilience and Capacity to Adapt (Cham: Springer International Publishing AG, 2017).

9

AFRICA’S POST-COLONIAL FOREIGN POLICY …

319

poverty, levels of education, necessary initial capital outlays necessary to purchase agricultural inputs—those farmers who also use farming as the primary economic activity but primarily depend on rainfall are more likely to experience hunger, malnutrition and lower standards of living, especially if and when crops fail for successive seasons. Climate change also bares its fangs in the El Niño and La Niña weather phenomena, occurring in recurring cycles of about 7 years. Further, prolonged natural events and environmental disasters such as the locust invasion in the Horn of Africa, the most recent of which began in December 2019 just as the COVID-19 pandemic was starting to ravage the world, make combating such infestations exceedingly difficult, given the diversion of resources to more pressing matters. Some environmental effects also occur in the middle of conflicts: Somalia and Yemen the origin of the locust infestation are in the middle of multi-year civil wars, droughts, the pandemic and the long rains that begin in April also regularly sweep away people and crops, exacerbating hunger. Poor governance and poor planning around disaster management and food security are also significant issues in most African countries: floods are almost always followed by drought, both cause hunger, but neither of these provoke any planning for water harvesting and subsequent irrigation in the more arid and semi-arid areas. Neither are there long-term plans for food security and storing dry goods so as to assure food security. The challenges of climate change, the environment and indicators for well-being are further starkly illustrated, even though there was a marked decrease in the negative indicators. Even with improvement in these indicators, the persistence of agriculture as the mainstay, and the reality of economies and jobs not growing at the same rate, continues to put pressure on the environment, available resources, arable land, increases human-wildlife conflict, decreases forest cover due to clearance for farming, habitation and energy purposes exerts increasing pressure. Africa’s population has continued to grow: for example, at independence, in 1960, the population was estimated at 283.4 million. This was important: in 30 short years, Africa’s population more than doubled, rising to 630.4 million in 1990. It more than doubled again, rising to an estimated 1.3 billion by early 2020—thus even as there are decreases evident in HDI indicators that are linked to the environment, the sheer numbers are staggering. Between 1990 and 2017, there was a visible percentage drop in the level of undernourishment, from 30% (190 million) to 20% (261 million); thus, although the rate declined, the

320

S. M. MAGU

actual numbers increased by close to 70 million. Other data follow in the general trends discussed previously. The percentage population of undernourished Africans in 2000 was 28%, while in 2018 it had dropped to 22.80%. This was in keeping in line with the average drop in prevalence of undernourishment as a percentage of population in developing countries since 1970; between 1990 and 2015, the rate fell from 23.3 to 12.90%. On the Global Hunger Index, in 2018, most countries in South Asia and sub-Saharan Africa received a score in the ‘serious’ or ‘alarming’ category. Most countries across Latin America, East & Central Asia and Eastern Europe had low hunger levels within the ‘low’ or ‘moderate’ categories. Even more alarming, in the ‘severe food insecurity’ variable, in 2018, 9.2 percent of the world population was considered severely food insecure; Africa saw an increase from 20 percent in 2014 to 25 percent in 2018.45 Decidedly, these numbers do not bode well for Africa, whose population is projected to nearly double again in the next 30 years, reaching 2.2 billion by 2050.46 Africa’s abundance of wildlife and other attractions—geographic, topographical and even human—holds a great potential for responsible exploitation in ways that can provide economic support and growth of a number of countries, although this requires long-term planning, particularly of shared resources such as wildlife that traverse sovereign nations—and a bit of peace and stability. Having significant endowment in natural resources, even as abundantly as oil is in the Gulf and Arabia is useful, and these nations provide are a good example for Africa. Their move away from petro carbons, primarily oil, and towards renewable energies such as solar and wind and biogas has led to diversification of their economies. While Africa may not benefit from constructing indoor skiing ranges in the middle of the Savannah, its management of the environment, coupled with climate change and its impact on the survival of wildlife as biodiversity and a source of tourist dollars is important. Tourism, in countries like Morocco, Egypt and Mauritius, brings these

45 Max Roser and Hannah Ritchie, “Hunger and Undernourishment,” Published online at OurWorldInData.org, Retrieved on May 21, 2020 from ‘https://ourworldindata.org/ hunger-and-undernourishment [Online Resource]. 46 Emil Suzuki, “World’s Population Will Continue to Grow and Will Reach Nearly 10 Billion by 2050,” World Bank Blogs. July 8, 2019. Retrieved on May 21, 2020 from https://blogs.worldbank.org/opendata/worlds-population-will-continue-grow-andwill-reach-nearly-10-billion-2050.

9

AFRICA’S POST-COLONIAL FOREIGN POLICY …

321

countries up to 22% of their foreign exchange, although tourism to Africa only accounts for 4% of the global totals.47 As Toulmin further notes, “many countries on the tourist trail already have very variable climates. Rising temperatures and water shortages will make them less appealing destinations. The distribution of wildlife will alter as a result of increased drought and changed temperatures.”48 More than anything else, Africa would do well to focus on developing climate change policy with mitigation strategies and the foresight of a population that will nearly double in the next 30 years, a full decade before the terminal date for the 2063 Agenda. Africa’s climate policy needs to be an active, rather than a reactive agenda. Major environmental and climate goals can be achieved. The tendency, the proclivity, to blame the rain gods, corruption at all levels of government ought to be replaced by farsighted climate policy and action. The opportunity for leaders to exercise god-complex, beg the west in order to embezzle must be the exception, rather than the rule. Nations’ forming watershed and environmental resources to preserve Africa’s heritage and biodiversity, conserve animals but achieve food sustainability and environmental stewardship are more important now. As China, the US and India point fingers and play chicken, Africa’s future depends on climate action. The importance of environmental sustainability made it to both the MDGs and their successors—for a good reason. In fact, the UN Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) read as though they were made for Africa: poverty, hunger, clean water and sanitation, energy, economic growth, sustainable communities, climate action and life below water and above land are essentially the definition of the climate actions that Africa must take—collectively, with enforcement, to stand a chance. AU and Regional/Global Governance: Diluting Sovereignty with Responsibility to Protect At first glance, the concepts of governance, humanitarian intervention and the end of the Cold War might not appear connected; yet global geopolitical changes can often elevate the importance of an issue that countries may have had little to no concern for. The bipolarity of the

47 Camilla Toulmin, Climate Change in Africa (London: Zed Books, 2012). 48 Toulmin, Climate Change, 139.

322

S. M. MAGU

Cold War era came to an end after the fall of the Soviet Union; the unipolar moment that saw unrivaled US hegemony also introduced a new dynamic to world order: the illusion of global governance, with significant implications for African countries. Issues that had hitherto been unimportant suddenly became part of a new wave of democratization, good governance and multiparty politics. These changes were urged on from two primary directions; the first was from donors, who emphasized implementation of the Washington Consensus proposals and the Structural Adjustment Programs that became a pre-condition for aid necessary due to the economic downturns of the 1970s and the slow recovery of the 1980s; in a number of the countries, aid programs were suspended, sometimes completely stopped pending the implementation of such changes. The second source of the push for change was domestic pressure from pro-democracy activists.49 The later was often part of longrunning protest movements and rebellions reacting to the one-party state tilt of most African countries in the 1960s and 1970s after a brief period of multiparty politics, while some were inspired by the broader sense of the wind of change sweeping across the world, the changes to the communist regimes in the Soviet Union, the Tiananmen Square in China, the transformations in Romania and the restive crowds in Hungary. There was largely general consensus, driven by a newly assertive US, on the emphasis for better governance as a precondition for aid by western donors, under such auspices as “The Paris Club,” even where specific countries had established prior programs or had colonial history with the countries.50 At the height of the use of this punitive phase of withholding aid, “at least 18 countries on the continent had their aid withheld during the early 1990s due to human rights abuses, military coups, corruption, or civil conflict.”51 Malawi, Kenya, Rwanda and Nigeria found themselves in this unenviable group. Just as often as the donors settled on the conditionalities, they were equally divided in the cases of a number of countries. For example, given Uganda’s long-running history of coups 49 Angelique Haugerud, The Culture of Politics in Modern Kenya

(Cambridge:

Cambridge University Press, 1993). 50 Danielle Resnick and Nicolas van de Walle, “Democratization in Africa: What Role for External Actors?” In Danielle Resnick and Nicolas van de Walle, Eds., Democratic Trajectories in Africa: Unravelling the Impact of Foreign Aid (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2013). 51 Resnick and van de Walle, “Democratization in Africa,” 35.

9

AFRICA’S POST-COLONIAL FOREIGN POLICY …

323

and counter-coups, and Museveni’s 4-year-old government (1996–1990 when such deliberations were ongoing), “European donors preferred to maintain the status quo due to Uganda’s role as a beacon of stability in East Africa. France appeared to be one of the least enthusiastic donors towards democracy, despite the rhetoric of Mitterrand and La Baulle.”52 The French, in some cases, applied pressure for the same kind of reforms, changes referred to in the Soviet fashion as ‘Paristroika.’53 Some of the programs were deeply unpopular and caused demonstrable harm to the economy (e.g., Zambia), with reversals in HDI and economic indicators. Soon, it was clear that all animals were not equal. African countries pointed out the west’s hypocrisy and inconsistency in donors’ positions. For example, the initial and long-term US support for non-democratic regimes in Africa and other areas such as Pakistan, Chile, Zaire and Malawi, “continues to be the basis of survival”54 of those autocratic regimes, and thus the conditionalities appeared to be mere pretexts for propagating underdevelopment in Africa. Democratic transitions did not necessarily produce better governance; in fact, most of the regimes that emerged as a result of the inorganic push to democratize were varied. “Stable autocracies emerged where incumbent, strong [political] parties faced a strong security threat. Volatile electoral democracies emerged when weak or non-existent authoritarian parties faced no security threat; but where weak parties faced serious security threats, the result was chronic regime instability.”55 Over the next 30 years, trajectories toward democratization, while necessarily unsuccessful, ushered in a period that opened up more space for the support of, for and by civil society, featuring the work of such organizations as USAID, the National Endowment for Democracy and USIA; the democratic space opened up much more, support for democracy-promoting organizations increased, while greater

52 Resnick and van de Walle, “Democratization in Africa,” 36. 53 Mohameden Ould-Mey, “Structural Adjustment Programs and Democratization in

Africa: The Case of Mauritania.” In John Mukum Mbaku and Julius O. Ihonvbere, Eds., Multiparty Democracy and Political Change: Constraints to Democratization in Africa (New York: Routledge, 2018). 54 Sahr John Kpundeh (ed.), Democratization in Africa: African Views, African Voices (Washington, DC: National Academy Press, 1992). 55 Nancy Bermeo and Deborah J. Yashar, “Mechanisms Matter.” In Nancy Bermeo and Deborah J. Yashar, Eds., Parties, Movements, and Democracy in the Developing World (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2016), 198–199.

324

S. M. MAGU

political space opened, although this did not necessarily produce lasting political change.56 In a few instances, transition to democracy occurred, and democratic rule held, primarily under incumbent ruling parties that attempted (sometimes under fraudulent circumstances) to consolidate their rule, but also by undertaking such practices as buying out rivals, assassinations or defections through financial incentive.57 “Specifically, for liberal multiparty electoral democracy to acquire its rightful place in the continent and gain proper foundation, credence and legitimacy, a number of issues need to be considered,”58 these include respect for laws and institutions, principled leadership, government by leaders, rather than ruling, people-centered constitutions, civil, political rights and freedoms respected and allow for diversity, democratisation of political parties, and electoral commissions be independent.59 The transition to democracy introduced a new, conflictual dimension even as they failed to change governments. Around elections, African countries have seen significant levels of conflict, some at the instigation of their leaders. Parties more often than not reproduced the schisms that had been evident in society, but now were given some legitimacy. Political parties were not formed on the basis of ideology even as they numbered in their hundreds; the key organizing principle was ethnic affiliation. Ethnicity was being reproduced as democracy, and in the context of the winner-take-all systems, communal conflict that often required external intervention increased. For most of the history of the existence of the Westphalian state, the principal principle was sovereignty, a concept that undergirded African independence and was sacrosanct by OAU’s charter and standards. As such, a seismic shift occurred; its genesis was the aftermath of Yugoslavia’s disintegration, the massacres with names such as Srebrenica, the Foˇca ethnic cleansing, and closer home, the Rwanda massacre and

56 Jude Howell and Jenny Pearce, Civil Society & Development: A Critical Exploration (Boulder: Lynne Rienner Publishers, 2002). 57 Rachel Beatty Riedl, Authoritarian Origins of Democratic Party Systems in Africa

(Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2014). 58 Korwa Gombe Adar, Abdalla Hamdok and Joram Rukambe, “Elections in Africa: The Way Forward.” In Korwa Gombe Adar, Abdalla Hamdok and Joram Rukambe, Electoral Process and the Prospects for Democracy Consolidation: Contextualising the African multiparty elections of 2004 (Pretoria: Africa Institute of South Africa, 2008). 59 Adar, Hamdok and Rukambe, “Elections in Africa,” 2008.

9

AFRICA’S POST-COLONIAL FOREIGN POLICY …

325

the low-intensity conflict that has plagued the Great Lakes Region for decades. Following the 2001 ICISS report on the Responsibility to Protect and the subsequent adoption of the General Assembly Resolution A/RES/60/1 during its Sixtieth session on October 24, 2005, the concept of sovereignty was transformed. To wit, the change articulated that “state sovereignty implies responsibility, and the primary responsibility for the protection of its people lies with the state itself; [and] where a population is suffering serious harm, as a result of internal war, insurgency, repression or state failure, and the state in question is unwilling or unable to halt or avert it, the principle of non-intervention yields to the international responsibility to protect.”60 In essence, the very premise that was central to the OAU and now to the AU was under threat. Would Africa’s affinity to the indivisible, unalterable fidelity to the principle of sovereignty persist? Just as was the case with the environmental issues, the African Union was forward-looking in the context of corrective action, at least in principle. Kuwali and Viljoen note that Article 4(h) of the Constitutive Act of the African Union (AU Constitutive Act), adopted in 2000 and entering into force in 2001 as the basis for AU’s 2002 launch, provided for intervention on this basis. “(h) the right of the Union to intervene in a Member State pursuant to a decision of the Assembly in respect of grave circumstances, namely: war crimes, genocide and crimes against humanity.”61 The UN, unlike the AU, has mechanisms for intervention in conflict situations, under the doctrine of the Responsibility to Protect. Interventions can stem from actions at the discretion of the Prosecutor of the International Criminal Court, the prosecutorial jurisdiction for crimes against humanity covered by the Responsibility to Protect (R2P) doctrine, or the Secretary General of the United Nations, the request of a member of the UN Security Council or the invitation by a country or as part of the settlement of disputes, as was the case in Kenya in 2008. The AU, almost two decades after it came into existence and despite a number of potential intervention opportunities—in Kenya, Burundi, Egypt, Tunisia, Libya, Sudan, Ivory Coast, the Congo and Republic of Congo, to name but 60 ICRC, The Responsibility to Protect : Research, Bibliography, Background. Supplementary Volume to the Report of the International Commission on Intervention and State Sovereignty (Ottawa, CA: IDRC, 2001). 61 African Union. “Constitutive Act,” (Web). Available from https://au.int/en/consti tutive-act.

326

S. M. MAGU

a few, has not initiated any interventions besides the support of missions such as the UN Mission to the Congo (MONUSCO), the UN stabilization mission to the DRC—AFIMSA, the UN + stabilization mission in Mali (MINUSMA), among others.62 For Africa and the AU, both the gaps in the application of the “right of the Union to intervene in a Member State pursuant to a decision of the Assembly,” particularly establishing at what point intervention is needed (e.g., whether a genocide has to be occurring as in 1994 Rwanda, or electoral violence such as 2015 Burundi, or 2008 in Kenya), the origin of such actions toward intervention—such as parallels to the UN Security Council emergency meetings—or in this case, meetings of the Peace and Security Council (PSC) or if initiated by the Panel of the Wise and whether the Assembly can overrule the recommendations of the council, particularly given the regional distribution of seats and countries’ interests. Of note is the reality that to date, the AU has never invoked AU’s article 4(h).63 Where the AU and its Peace and Security Council (PSC) have hesitated in taking actions, the UN Security Council, individual countries and the ICC Prosecutor(s) haves not shied away from taking actions to refer cases, or initiate prosecution. The first such indictment was for Joseph Kony, four years after the court started work. But it would take on an ominous note for African leaders, when Omar al-Bashir, Sudan’s president, was summoned to the ICC on March 4, 2009. The resolution of other issues, the African position on these, the precise actions to take, the level of jurisdiction, the level of foreign governments and whether or not African leaders would arrest a fellow leader and hand them over to the ICC have not always been as clear—indeed, they have raised issues of note, not even slightly addressed by the AU. For example, even though a Belgian court, prosecuting him under ‘Belgian War Crimes Law’ found former US/French protégé and Chad president, Hissène Habré, often referred to as Africa’s Pinochet for the deaths of 40,000 and torture of over 200,000. The ultimate trial of Habré—after

62 Dan Kuwali and Frans Viljoen, “Introduction.” In Dan Kuwali and Frans Viljoen, Eds., Africa and the Responsibility to Protect : Article 4(h) of the African Union Constitutive Act (New York: Routledge, 2014). 63 International Refugee Rights Initiative, “From Non-Interference to Non-Indifference: The African Union and the Responsibility to Protect,” (International Refugee Rights Initiative, 2017).

9

AFRICA’S POST-COLONIAL FOREIGN POLICY …

327

10 years of back and forth over jurisdiction based on Senegal’s establishment of an international, Extraordinary African Chambers court, a special tribunal established after Senegal’s parliament passed a law allowing for it, ended with a guilty verdict for crimes against humanity and a life sentence; arguably a first especially in Africa. The earlier back-and-forth jurisdictional tiff brought in the AU in the era of the responsibility to protect, leading to the appointment at the 2006 AU Summit, of eminent African jurists to decide on (a) the validity of the Belgian guilty conviction, (b) Habré’s extradition request and (c) whether Habré could be tried by an African country or court. Elsewhere, this has been suggested to be the first instance of the AU’s intervention under Article 4(h) in a member country’s affairs.64 The case of Sudanese president, Omar al-Bashir, was a little more complex. Coming at the end of the near 4-decade war with a restive south marked by the Naivasha Peace Process and the Comprehensive Peace Agreement (CPA) that allowed for a referendum on the status of the south, an arrest warrant by the ICC was issued in 2006 for Bashir, on account of the Darfur conflict, which raged between 2003 and 2008. Al-Bashir was accused of bearing the greatest responsibility, as the head of state, for facilitating use of state resources (military, police, militia and especially Janjaweed militia) to commit crimes against humanity including rape, murder, extermination, forcible transfer, disappearance and torture of non-Arab populations that included the Fur or Darfur. Regional and international reaction was mixed; for example, in 2013, Bashir attended an international AIDS conference in Nigeria, which made no attempt to arrest him; Nigeria’s president argued that doing so would jeopardize the Comprehensive Peace Agreement and other regional peace initiatives, but also reflected a broader African reticence toward arresting one of their own, to hand him over to a court considered the ‘court for Africans.’65 In 2015, Bashir came closer to being arrested as he attended an AU summit; South African civil society members went to court seeking a judgment and to compel the government to adhere to its obligations to the 64 Ibrahima Kane, Nobuntu Mbelle and AfriMAP, Towards a People-driven African Union: Current Obstacles & New Opportunities (Oxford: African Books Collective, 2007). 65 Mark Leon Goldberg, “Sudan’s Bashir Travels Freely to Nigeria. A Huge Blow to the ICC,” UN Dispatch—United News & Commentary, Global News Forum, July 15, 2013. https://www.undispatch.com/sudans-bashir-travels-freely-to-nig eria-a-huge-blow-to-the-icc/.

328

S. M. MAGU

Rome Statute, to arrest Bashir and hand him over to the ICC. Al-Bashir departed South Africa early Monday morning even as the High Court ruled he should not leave before it ruled on [South Africa’s obligation] to arrest him and hand him over to the ICC; as a signatory to the Rome Statute establishing the ICC, South Africa was obligated to arrest him. Later, the president of the High Court, Judge Dunstan Mlambo, ruled perhaps in a face-saving measure, that “he should have been held, ‘the government’s failure to arrest Bashir is inconsistent with the Constitution.’”66 At the same time, even countries that might have been expected to be on the side of punishment for perpetrators of genocide waffled; besides the (mostly split) support for Sudan among the African Union, member states of the Arab League and the OIC were less supportive of the ICC and its warrant, but also so were the governments of neighboring countries, most alleging a neo-colonial attitude toward Africa and Sudan. The US, despite expressing support for ICC and its investigations, held that “we are under no obligation to the ICC to arrest President Bashir. We’re not a party to the Rome Statute. And let’s leave it at that.”67 Inexplicably, the US left the onus on Bashir to ‘do the right thing’ about the warrant. Another remarkable case was that of Kenya’s 2007 post-election violence. Following the announcement of the election results, ethnic violence broke out primarily between members of the Kikuyu ethnic group, whose incumbent’s candidate was announced as the winner, and the Luo ethnic group, the challenger of whom was catching up to the incumbent.68 Relative to most of the other situations in which there have been some sort of intervention—including Libya, Kenya’s situation was surprising, but the country was relatively ‘stable’ and potentially less likely to lead to a failed state. Yet when Kenya could no longer fulfill its accepted “responsibility to protect their populations from genocide, war

66 David A. Graham, “How a Suspected War Criminal Got Away: Omar al-Bashir’s Escape from South Africa and the dilemma of the International Criminal Court,” The Atlantic, June 16, 2015. https://www.theatlantic.com/international/archive/2015/06/ omar-bashir-sudan-icc/395930/. 67 Alexis Arieff, Marjorie Ann Browne, Rhoda Margesson and Matthew C. Weed, International Criminal Court Cases in Africa: Status and Policy Issues, (Washington, DC: CRS, 2010), 16. 68 Stephen Magu, The Socio-Cultural, Ethnic and Historic Foundations of Kenya’s Electoral Violence: Democracy on Fire (New York: Routledge, 2018).

9

AFRICA’S POST-COLONIAL FOREIGN POLICY …

329

crimes, crimes against humanity and ethnic cleansing, the international community, through the United Nations (UN), commits to ‘the responsibility to use appropriate diplomatic, humanitarian and other peaceful means…to help to protect populations.”69 In Kenya’s case, rapid negotiations between the AU’s Panel of Eminent Persons, an agreement to establish a Government of National Unity (GNU)—followed the same year by Zimbabwe—quickly settled the issue. Part of the peace settlement and the power sharing agreement was the Waki envelope, containing names of individuals thought to bear the greatest responsibility for the post-election violence and who would be persecuted at the ICC, if Kenya failed to establish the mechanism; it was unable to. By the time the Kenyan case made it to the ICC the prosecution simply targeted six individuals, charges against three of them, i.e., Muhammed Ali (Commissioner of Police), Henry Kosgey and Francis Muthaura were dropped between 2012 and 2013. The remaining charges against three individuals, Uhuru Kenyatta, William Ruto and Joshua Sang’ were seen as the most problematic. For even though the charges had been related to the 2007 General Election, in 2013, Uhuru Kenyatta was elected president of Kenya, and William Ruto his deputy president. In Kenya, this split opinion, but mostly, on the side of ‘neo-colonialism,’ on the need to focus on healing and forgiveness—considering that the top two leaders, who had been allegedly on different sides of the ‘bloodletting,’ were now president and deputy president. The notion that the ICC was targeting Africans did indeed gain a lot of traction; Ethiopia’s then Prime Minister suggested that the ICC was undertaking ‘race-hunting’ and Kenyatta, at the same address, lamented that the ICC did not respect African countries’ sovereignty.70 Desalegn also suggested that the cases especially against Kenyatta and his deputy should be referred to domestic courts; this position had a lot of support from other African leaders.71 69 Ademola Abass, “The African Union and the Responsibility to Protect: Principles and Limitations.” In Julia Hoffmann, André Nollkaemper and Isabelle Swerissen, Eds., Responsibility to Protect: From Principle to Practice (Amsterdam: Pallas Publications, 2012), 214. 70 Lyal S. Sunga, “Has the ICC Unfairly Targeted Africa or Has Africa Unfairly Targeted the ICC?” In Triestino Mariniello, Ed., The International Criminal Court in Search of its Purpose and Identity (New York: Routledge, 2015). 71 Mark S. Ellis, Sovereignty and Justice: Balancing the Principle of Complementarity Between International and Domestic War Crimes Tribunals (Newcastle Upon Tyne: Cambridge Scholars Publishing, 2014).

330

S. M. MAGU

African leaders and the AU demanded changes to the standards of evidence, court funding from NGOs (suspected to be interested parties), safeguarding the rights of the accused and the court’s power and use of proprio motu (its own initiative) to initiate cases.72 For their part, the accused complied with the terms of the court, including the unprecedented first, when a sitting president attended a hearing of the ICC, before the requirement to attend in person was relaxed. Kenyatta “emphasized that he took his obligations before him seriously. Second, Kenyatta referred to the charges before him as a personal challenge given that the crimes he stood accused of committing were alleged to have taken place prior to his assuming office.”73 Kenyatta and his deputy’s actions had a different impact: ICC prosecutes ‘those bearing greatest responsibility’ to the crimes committed. At the time of his prosecution, he held no official titles or positions, although it is the case that such individuals as Felicien Kabuga were accused of funding, rather than personally committing these crimes. At the same time, the issue of prosecuting African leaders in European courts must of necessity brook accusations of neo-colonialism, even if that was not necessarily the intent. The post-Cold War era has produced both challenges and potential pathways to address good governance, for both Africa and the world— rather unfortunately, as a result of some of the most horrible genocides the modern world has endured, including in Rwanda and on an ongoing basis, in the Great Lakes region of Africa. The inaction during these genocides spurred the world to enter a period of reconfigured sovereignty, clearly a different phase for both Africa and the global community. Africa’s integration of the right to intervene in an AU member state’s internal affairs—even though it has not done so on any appreciable scale particularly based on Article 4(h) of the AU Constitutive Act, the implications of the Rome Statute and the International Criminal Court, the rapid intervention by different organs—whether it’s the ad hoc constituted Panel of Eminent Persons in the case of Kenya’s 2007 post-election violence have been of immense value. The functional partnership, the threat of intervention through the AU, the intervention in places such as the Ivory Coast by Africa’s partners (France), IGAD’s intervention under IGADSOM that

72 Ellis, Sovereignty and Justice, 2014. 73 Serena Sharma, The Responsibility to Protect and the International Criminal Court :

Protection and Prosecution in Kenya (New York: Routledge, 2016), 111.

9

AFRICA’S POST-COLONIAL FOREIGN POLICY …

331

turned into AU’s peacekeeping mission in Somalia under AMISOM, and ECOWAS intervention in Gambia have demonstrated a renewed level of activity that bears promise. Organs of the African Union, together with Regional Economic Communities (ECOWAS—and its military arm ECOMOG), foreign ‘partnerships’ and pressure from such bodies as in the case of Laurent Gbagbo in the Ivory Coast, France, have been enforcers of the R2P and article 4(h) precepts, and it is clear that Africa’s investment in the pursuit of better governance outcomes might have just that much more promise.

Concluding Thoughts: From Pan-Africanism to Agenda 2063---A Future of Our Own There is much to be hopeful for, for the future of Africa, across the different levels of engagement and actions, even as the challenges before its citizens, leaders, institutions and its future continue to require new, collaborative, forward-thinking solutions and partnerships. Institutions that the continent has sought to engage to build this future have begun to coalesce. The continent is site to a creative, dynamic and youthful workforce, potentially a blessing but also likely a burden on creating jobs for the future, in a continent where its 150 million shy of a billion population still works in the agricultural industry. Institutionally, Africa evinces a renewed promise of Pan Africanism, a promise that is becoming more evident and more pronounced through regional and continental level activities. For Africa especially, Regional Economic Communities have brought about greater cooperation and collaboration, and have, for the first time, demonstrated the potential molding a path to continental integration, even as the world’s largest free trade area works to become a customs union. At the leadership level actions include fostering better leadership through the New Partnership for Africa’s Development and the African Peer Review Mechanism (APRM). Africa’s Agenda 2063 is quite ambitious, and Africa is more than halfway to this goal; among other priorities, there are issues, stops along the path, including reaching the Sustainable Development Goals, still quite a ways. There is much to do, but there are also conclusions that can be reached. First, it is evident that cooperation is a defining principle of the interactions between African countries, and has been even before they first banded together to form the Organization of African Unity in 1963. But even as they cooperated, this cooperation was beset by regional, personal,

332

S. M. MAGU

ideological and historical rivalries that often stood in the way of accomplishing their goals as expeditiously as possible. Malawi and Ivory Coast’s approach to the issue of South Africa’s apartheid government is a clear example of the early challenges. The recent tiff with the Eco—whether to establish it as a new currency or to rename the CFA with France’s permission shows these rifts. Countries that colonized Africa continue to exert an inexplicable, but tight grip on these countries, now independent for six decades. The levels of control are especially notable with Francophone countries, although former British colonies continue to be active participants and members of the Commonwealth. The diffusion of centers of power for English-speaking countries has seen this hold fracture, but the admiration and the collaborations evident in the Anglophone, the Francophone and Lusophone countries continue to be a barrier to African countries’ ability to collaborate, to unite and to adopt more Africa-centric common positions on issues. Regional Economic Communities, or RECs, have been a feature of Africa, since before most African countries gained independence. These regional organizations continued for the most part, and in some instances were transformed. At the same time, some failed—one of the spectacular failures was by the first East African Community (EAC I), while in other areas, the economic communities either took on a linguistic (French) flavor, or suffered great suspicion (as was the case with ECOWAS, which was started by Nigeria). Personalities were also a factor in the effectiveness—or not—of the different RECs and even the continental organizations; Félix Houphouët-Boigny’s aversion to flying anywhere else but France is well known. Africa’s goals must also be pursued not by imitating other countries, but by defining a future for Africa, and as a well-regarded West African intellectual, Abdou Cisse once said, Africans have to start to ask: ‘what questions are we not asking?’ It might sound more like the whole Rumsfeldian ‘unknown unknowns,’ but Africa needs to think about the questions it’s not asking, thinking about unknown unknowns. A continent, for instance, that has sunshine most places most of the day, need not suffer the same power challenges as does the snowy North America or a cold Europe; floods do not have to be followed by drought, and sixty years later, it is actively embarrassing to still not have food security. This is especially critical, halfway to 2063. In the context of thinking about the questions not being asked, Africa’s youth is rapidly growing at a pace that jobs cannot keep up with. The time to plan for the youth’s future is not when the youth are adults;

9

AFRICA’S POST-COLONIAL FOREIGN POLICY …

333

Africa must start asking those questions of, ‘what jobs do they need?’ It is also paramount to involve the same youth, not as token representatives, but in ways that recognize that the youth will be designing the future. Designing and defining this future with ‘like-minded nations’ such as those in the Global South and in the Caribbean and Pacific is practical, but partnerships where African nations can obtain useful technology transfer from the Global North to aid in creating their own technology solutions to specific African challenges are necessary, and urgent. It is necessary for Africa to consider issue linkage—even those issues that they are not thinking about. In all cases, considering Africa’s experience, the current realities, the future needs and pathways to there is more important than those approaches that seek to import what has worked in the west. Africa must define, design and then implement the future that it must dream. This extends to, and includes foreign policy.

References Abass, Ademola. “The African Union and the Responsibility to Protect: Principles and Limitations.” In Responsibility to Protect: From Principle to Practice. Edited by Julia Hoffmann, André Nollkaemper and Isabelle Swerissen. Amsterdam: Pallas, 2012. Adar, Korwa Gombe, Abdalla Hamdok and Joram Rukambe. “Elections in Africa: The Way Forward.” In Electoral Process and the Prospects for Democracy Consolidation: Contextualising the African Multiparty Elections of 2004. Edited by Korwa Gombe Adar, Abdalla Hamdok and Joram Rukambe. Pretoria: AISA, 2008. The African Union. “The African Union Counter Terrorism Framework.” Divisions—African Union Peace and Security (November 23, 2015). http://www. peaceau.org/en/page/64-counter-terrorism-ct. African Union. “Constitutive Act” (Web). Available from https://au.int/en/con stitutive-act. Arieff, Alexis. Marjorie Ann Browne, Rhoda Margesson and Matthew C. Weed. International Criminal Court Cases in Africa: Status and Policy Issues. Washington, DC: CRS, 2010. Beasley, Ryan K., Juliet Kaarbo and Jeffrey S. Lantis, “The Analysis of Foreign Policy in Comparative Perspective.” In Foreign Policy in Comparative Perspective: Domestic and International Influences on State Behavior. 1st ed. Edited by Ryan K. Beasley, Juliet Kaarbo and Jeffrey S. Lantis. Thousand Oaks: CQ Press, 2013.

334

S. M. MAGU

Bermeo, Nancy and Deborah J. Yashar. “Mechanisms Matter.” In Parties, Movements, and Democracy in the Developing World. Edited by Nancy Bermeo and Deborah J. Yashar. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2016. Bertrand, Eloïse and Nic Cheeseman. “Understanding The G5: Governance, Development and Security in the Sahel, NATO Allied Command Transformation (ACT) OPEN Publications. Vol. 3, No. 2, sp. 2019. Blanchard, Christopher M. Libya: Unrest and U.S. Policy. Washington, DC: CRS, 2011. Cocodia, Jude. Peacekeeping and the African Union: Building Negative Peace. New York: Routledge, 2018. Dersso, Solomon. “African Foreign Policy Making in the African Union: Peace and Security.” In Contemporary Africa and the Foreseeable World Order. Edited by Francis Onditi, Gilad Ben-Nun, Cristina D’Alessandro and Zack Levey. Lanham: Lexington, 2019. di Falco, Salvatore. “Adaptation to Climate Change in Sub-Saharan Agriculture: Assessing the Evidence and Rethinking the Drivers.” In Agricultural Adaptation to Climate Change in Africa: Food Security in a Changing Environment (Environment for Development). 1st ed. Edited by Cyndi Spindell Berck, Peter Berck and Salvatore Di Falco. NY: Routledge, 2018. Ellis, Mark S. Sovereignty and Justice: Balancing the Principle of Complementarity Between International and Domestic War Crimes Tribunals. Newcastle-uponTyne: Cambridge, 2014. Graham, David A. “How a Suspected War Criminal Got Away: Omar al-Bashir’s Escape from South Africa and the Dilemma of the International Criminal Court.” The Atlantic (June 16, 2015). https://www.theatlantic.com/intern ational/archive/2015/06/omar-bashir-sudan-icc/395930/. Haugerud, Angelique. The Culture of Politics in Modern Kenya. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1993. Howell, Jude and Jenny Pearce. Civil Society & Development: A Critical Exploration. Boulder: Lynne Rienner, 2002. ICRC. The Responsibility to Protect: Research, Bibliography, Background. Supplementary Volume to the Report of the International Commission on Intervention and State Sovereignty. Ottawa, CA: IDRC, 2001. Inman, Kris. “The Legacy of Exile: Terrorism in and Outside Africa from Osama Bin Laden to al-Shabaab.” In Africans in Exile: Mobility, Law, and Identity. Edited by Benjamin N. Lawrence and Nathan Riley Carpenter. Bloomington: IUP, 2018. International Criminal Court. “Pre-Trial Chamber II Requests Nigeria to Immediately Arrest Omar Al Bashir.”. Press Release, (September 16, 2013) ICC-CPI-20130716-PR932. https://www.icc-cpi.int/Pages/item.aspx?name= pr932&ln=en.

9

AFRICA’S POST-COLONIAL FOREIGN POLICY …

335

International Refugee Rights Initiative. “From Non-Interference to NonIndifference: The African Union and the Responsibility to Protect.” International Refugee Rights Initiative, 2017. Iqbal, Zaryab and Harvey Starr. State Failure in the Modern World. Stanford: Stanford, 2016. Jiri, Obert and Paramu Mafongoya. “A Synthesis of Smallholder Farmers’ Adaptation to Climate Change in Southern Africa: Averting Adaptation Vacuum.” In Climate Change Adaptation in Africa: Fostering Resilience and Capacity to Adapt, Edited by Walter Leal Filho, Belay Simane, Jokasha Kalangu, Menas Wuta, Pantaleo Munishi and Kumbirai Musiyiwa. Cham: Springer, 2017. Kane, Ibrahima, Nobuntu Mbelle and AfriMAP. Towards a People-Driven African Union: Current Obstacles & New Opportunities. Oxford: African Books Collective, 2007. Kiss, Alexandre and Dinah Shelton. Guide to International Environmental Law. Leiden: Martinus Nijhoff, 2007. Kpundeh, Sahr John, Ed. Democratization in Africa: African Views, African Voices. Washington, DC: National Academy Press, 1992. Kuwali, Dan and Frans Viljoen. “Introduction.” In Africa and the Responsibility to Protect: Article 4(h) of the African Union Constitutive Act. Edited by Dan Kuwali and Frans Viljoen. New York: Routledge, 2014. Lansford, Tom. Political Handbook of the World 2018–2019, Vol. 1. Thousand Oaks: CQ Press, 2019. Magu, Stephen. The Socio-Cultural, Ethnic and Historic Foundations of Kenya’s Electoral Violence: Democracy on Fire, New York: Routledge, 2018. Maguwu, Farai and Shakespear Hamauswa. “BRICS and the New Scramble for Zimbabwe in the Aftermath of the Military Coup.” In BRICS and Resistance in Africa: Contention, Assimilation and Co-optation. Edited by Justin van der Merwe and Patrick Bond. London: Zed Books, 2019. McCaul, Michael. Failures of Imagination: The Deadliest Threats to Our Homeland—And How to Thwart Them. New York: Crown Forum, 2016. McGowan, Patrick J. “African Military Coups D’état, 1956–2001: Frequency, Trends and Distribution.” The Journal of Modern African Studies, Vol. 41, No. 3 (September, 2003): 339–370. https://www.jstor.org/stable/3876235. Neack, Laura. The New Foreign Policy: U.S. and Comparative Foreign Policy in the 21st Century. Lanham, MD: Rowman & Littlefield, 2003. Oakley, Robert. “America’s Security Role: The Horn of Africa.” In Global Strategic Assessment 2009: America’s Security Role in a Changing World. Edited by Patrick M. Cronin. Washington, DC: NDU Press, 2009. Okoth, P. Godfrey. “Conflict Resolution in Africa: The Role of the OAU & the AU.” In The Resolution of African Conflicts: The Management of Conflict Resolution & Post-Conflict Reconstruction. Edited by Alfred G. Nhema and Paul Tiyambe Zeleza. Oxford: James Currey, 2008.

336

S. M. MAGU

Osmanczyk, ´ Edmund Jan. Ed., Encyclopedia of the United Nations and International Agreements: A to F, 3rd ed., Vol. 3: N-S. New York: Routledge, 2003. Ould-Mey, Mohameden. “Structural Adjustment Programs and Democratization in Africa: The Case of Mauritania.” In Multiparty Democracy and Political Change: Constraints to Democratization in Africa. Edited by John Mukum Mbaku and Julius O. Ihonvbere. New York: Routledge, 2018. Regan, Patrick M. “Interventions into Civil Wars: Literature, Contemporary Policy, and Future Research.” In Routledge Handbook of Civil Wars. Edited by Edward Newman and Karl DeRouen, Jr. New York: Routledge, 2014. Resnick, Danielle and Nicolas van de Walle. “Democratization in Africa: What Role for External Actors?” In Democratic Trajectories in Africa: Unravelling the Impact of Foreign Aid. Edited by Danielle Resnick and Nicolas van de Walle. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2013. Riedl, Rachel Beatty. Authoritarian Origins of Democratic Party Systems in Africa. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2014. Roser, Max and Hannah Ritchie. “Hunger and Undernourishment.” OurWorldInData.org. ‘https://ourworldindata.org/hunger-and-undern ourishment‘. Scanlon, John and Françoise Burhenne-Guilmin Eds., International Environmental Governance: An International Regime for Protected Areas (IUCN Environmental Policy and Law Paper). Cambridge, UK: IUCN, 2004. Schmidt, Brian. “Theories of US Foreign Policy.” In US Foreign Policy. 2nd ed. Edited by Michael Cox and Doug Stokes. New York: Oxford University Press, 2012. Sharma, Serena. The Responsibility to Protect and the International Criminal Court: Protection and Prosecution in Kenya. New York: Routledge, 2016. Shultz Jr., Richard H. and Andrea J. Dew. Insurgents, Terrorists, and Militias: The Warriors of Contemporary Combat. New York: Columbia University Press, 2006. Sunga, Lyal S. “Has the ICC Unfairly Targeted Africa or Has Africa Unfairly Targeted the ICC?” In The International Criminal Court in Search of Its Purpose and Identity. Edited by Triestino Mariniello. New York: Routledge, 2015. Sur, Serge. International Law, Power, Security and Justice: Essays on International Law and Relations. Oxford: Hart Publishing, 2010. Suzuki, Emil. “World’s Population Will Continue to Grow and Will Reach Nearly 10 Billion by 2050.” World Bank Blogs (September 8, 2019). https://blogs.worldbank.org/opendata/worlds-population-willcontinue-grow-and-will-reach-nearly-10-billion-2050.

9

AFRICA’S POST-COLONIAL FOREIGN POLICY …

337

Tieku, Thomas Kwasi. “The African Union.” In Responding to Conflict in Africa: The United Nations and Regional Organizations. Edited by Jane Boulden. New York: Palgrave, 2013. Thomas, Urs P. “Environmental Politics, Trade and United Nations Reform.” In United Nations Reform: Looking Ahead after Fifty Years. Edited by Eric Fawcett and Hanna Newcombe. Toronto: Science for Peace, 1995. Toulmin, Camilla. Climate Change in Africa. London: Zed Books, 2012. UN Department of Peacekeeping Operations. “Somalia—UNOSOM I: Background.” DPKO. https://peacekeeping.un.org/mission/past/unosom1ba ckgr2.html. UN General Assembly. Resolution Adopted by the General Assembly on 16 September 2005. A/RES/60/1, 60th session, 10/24/2005, Items 46 & 120. https://peacemaker.un.org/node/95. UN Office on Genocide Prevention and the Responsibility to Protect. “Responsibility to Protect—About.” n.d. https://www.un.org/en/genocideprevent ion/about-responsibility-to-protect.shtml. Volger, Helmut. “UN Office Nairobi.” In A Concise Encyclopedia of the United Nations: Second Revised Edition. Edited by Helmut Volger. Leiden: Martinus Nijhoff, 2010. Warnes, Richard. “Al Shabaab.” In Terrorism: The Essential Reference Guide. Edited by Colin P. Clarke. Santa Barbara: ABC-Clio, 2018. Williamson, Myra. Terrorism, War and International Law: The Legality of the Use of Force Against Afghanistan in 2001. New York: Ashgate, 2009. Wippman, David. “Pro-Democratic Intervention by Invitation.” In Democratic Governance and International Law. Edited by Gregory H. Fox and Brad R. Roth. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2000. Woodward, Susan L. The Ideology of Failed States: Why Intervention Fails. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2017. World Conservation Union. An Introduction to the African Convention on the Conservation of Nature and Natural Resources. IUCN Environmental Policy and Law Paper No. 56 Rev. 2nd ed. IUCN: Gland, Switzerland, 2006. Zhou, Takavafira Masarira. “Governance, Democratisation and Development in post-Mugabe Zimbabwe.” In Mugabeism after Mugabe? Rethinking Legacies and the New Dispensation in Zimbabwe’s ‘Second Republic.” Edited by Fidelis Peter Thomas Duri, Ngonidzashe Marongwe and Munyaradzi Mawere. Masvingo: Africa Talent Publishers 2019.

Index

A Abolition of Slavery Act, 267 Abuja Treaty, 73, 241, 242 Abyei, 220 Abyssinia, 62, 63 AEC, 15, 68, 73, 241, 242, 255, 257 AfCFTA. See Africa Continental Free Trade Area Africa-Caribbean and Pacific, 166 Africa, Caribbean and Pacific States, 240 Africa Continental Free Trade Area, 253 African Centre for the Study and Research on Terrorism (ACSRT), 314 African Commission on Human and Peoples’ Rights, xv, 73 African Continental Free Trade Area (AfCFTA), 277 African Convention on the Conservation of Nature and Natural Resources, 316

African Court on Human and Peoples’ Right, 73 African Economic Community, 241 African High Command, 100, 138 African Liberation Committee, 73, 75, 76 African Ministerial Conference of Trade, Development and Monetary Problems, 245 African Peer Review Mechanism (APRM), 13, 331 Africa’s foreign policy, 3, 8, 11, 12, 14–16, 22, 301 Afro-Asian Latin American People’s Solidarity Organization, 70 Agenda 2063, 15, 305, 331 Ag˜ık˜ uy˜ u, vii. See also Kikuyu AGOA, 252 Aguiyi-Ironsi, Major Gen., 214 Ahmed Sékou Touré, 121 Air France Flight 139, 174, 311 Air France Flight 8969, 312 ALC, 73, 76, 160. See also African Liberation Committee

© The Editor(s) (if applicable) and The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2021 S. M. Magu, Explaining Foreign Policy in Post-Colonial Africa, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-62930-4

339

340

INDEX

Algerian National Liberation front, 129 Algerian War of Independence, 129 All-African Peoples Conference, 67, 70, 71 All-African Trade Union Federation, 70 Almond’s Mood theory, 20 American Colonization Society, 118 Amharic, 62, 63, 209 Amin. See Amin, Idi Amin, Idi Tanzania invasion, 32 AMISOM, 5, 6, 15, 275, 309, 314, 315, 331 AMIS peacekeeping mission, 288 AMU (Arab Maghreb Union), 245 ANC (African National Congress), 77, 78, 132, 139, 141, 169, 272, 300, 301 Anglo-Egyptian treaty 1902, 9 1929, 9, 10, 183 Anglo-Ethiopian Treaty, 170 Anglo-German agreement, 85, 88 Anglophone, 4, 166, 255, 332 Apartheid, ix, 4, 6, 16, 62, 67, 71, 75, 120, 121, 123, 125–133, 136, 139, 140, 143, 144, 146, 160, 162, 163, 225, 269, 286, 300–302, 332 APRM. See Africa Peer Review Mechanism Arab League, 32, 65, 129, 131, 132, 146, 166–169, 289, 328 Arab. League, 308 Arab socialism, 220 Arab Spring, 13, 167, 168, 274–276, 284, 288, 303 Atlantic Charter, 105, 106 Atlantic slave trade, 267 AU Charter, 310

AU Commission Chair, 5 AU Constitutive Act, 325, 330 Augustine of Hippo, vii AU Peace Fund, 288 AU pillars, 255 AU Plan of Action on the Prevention and Combating of Terrorism, 314 AU Special Representative for Counter-Terrorism Cooperation, 314 AU summit, 327 Azania Liberation Front, 219 B Bakassi Peninsula, 7, 90 Bamako Convention, 241 Banda, Hastings Kamuzu, 7, 80, 101, 124–126 Bandung Conference Indonesia, 1955, 10, 68, 112, 169 Bandung meeting. See Bandung Conference Barre, Siad, 306 Battle of Adwa, 62, 63, 178 Belgrade Conference. See Non-Aligned Movement Berlin Conference, 62, 81, 82, 116, 145, 176, 234 Berlin Wall, 15 Biafra, 122, 154, 193, 194, 213–218 Biafra War, 213 Bien Dien Phu, 168 Blue Nile, 9 Boko Haram, 40, 312–315 Bounded Rationality/Cybernetic Model, 26 Brazil, 8, 53, 266–270, 277, 290 Brazzaville Group Brazzaville, 11, 66, 67, 92 Bretton Woods Institutions, 14, 220 BRICs, 15, 16, 53, 265, 266, 274, 277, 290

INDEX

Briggs, Wenike Nigeria’s Trade Minister, 240 British South Africa Company, 133, 135 Bush George H.W., 28, 48, 221 C Cairo Agenda for Action, 243 Cairo Declaration, 185, 224 Cairo Resolution, 205 Camp Victory, 34 Casablanca Group, 67, 241 Casablanca, 11, 65, 72, 93 CEMAC (Central African Economic and Monetary Community), 245 CEN-SAD, 156 Center for Systemic Peace, 80 Central African Federation, 135 CFA-Eco, 256 CFA Franc, 255 Charter. See United Nations China, 8, 46, 49, 51–53, 68, 93, 104, 107, 108, 110, 116, 117, 219, 243, 251, 265–267, 273–277, 283–291, 321, 322 China Trade and Investment Promotion Centers, 288 CMC. See Cuban Missile Crisis Cold War, 4, 7, 8, 10, 12, 13, 15, 16, 21, 37, 48, 62, 65, 69, 77, 80, 93, 99, 101, 113–115, 118, 128, 137, 154, 173, 175, 176, 182, 185, 217, 221, 238, 265, 270–273, 277, 285, 286, 308, 321, 330 post-Cold War period, 8, 308 COMESA, 156, 245 The Commonwealth, 127, 158, 161, 162, 250 Commonwealth of Nations. See The Commonwealth

341

Comprehensive Peace Agreement, 219, 220, 222, 327 Naivasha, Kenya (2005), 219 Con-Div Group Dynamic, 28 1st Conference of Independent African States, 70 Confucius Institutes, 289 Congo crisis, 72, 79, 93, 94 Tshombe, Moise, 79 Conseil de l’Entente, 121 Conventions, vii, 63, 106 COREMO, 77 Corruption Perceptions Index, 13 Cotonou Agreement, 252 Council of Ministers OAU, 73, 78, 114 COVID-19, 15, 39, 252–254, 270, 284, 287, 291, 300, 319 CPI. See Corruption Perceptions Index Cuban Missile Crisis, 27, 33, 36, 38, 287 Cybernetic Theory. See Bounded Rationality/Cybernetic Model

D Darfur, 13, 193, 288, 312, 327 Decision model, 28, 48 Decolonization, 4, 74, 102, 104, 109, 115, 141, 169, 269 Derg, 181 Deutsch-Ostafrikanische Gesellschaft German East Africa Company, 82 Domestic audience, 50 Dutch East India Company, 127

E EAC, 11, 71, 156, 159, 160, 174, 241, 245, 255, 332. See also East African Community

342

INDEX

EACSO, 71. See also East African Common Services Organization East African Common Services Organization, xv, 11 East African Community, 11, 156, 159, 332 East African High Commission, 11 ECA Conference of Ministers, 244 ECCAS, 156, 241, 245 ECOMOG, 14, 87, 157, 303, 331 Economic Community of West Africa, 122 ECOSOC, 107, 244, 247, 257, 302. See also UN Economic and Social Council ECOWAS, 12, 14, 87, 122, 123, 156, 157, 241, 245, 254–256, 270, 302, 331, 332 El Adde, 52, 315 Emperor Haile Selassie, 168–170, 181, 217 Eritrea-Ethiopia Boundary Commission, 184 Eritrea-Ethiopia War. See Ethiopia-Eritrea War Eritrean Liberation Army, 181 Eritrean Liberation Front, 181 Eritrean Liberation Movement, 181 Eritrean People’s Liberation Army, 181 Eritrean People’s Liberation Front, 181 Ethiopia-Eritrea War, 182, 184 Ethiopian People’s Revolutionary Democratic Front, 181 EU Council Joint Action 851, 275 EU NAVFOR. See Operation ATALANTA European Union, 6, 165, 183, 252, 274, 275, 289, 308

Expanded programme of technical assistance. See Expanded Program of Technical Assistance (EPTA) Expanded Program of Technical Assistance (EPTA), 245

F First Ogaden War, 171, 172 First Sudanese Civil War, 218, 219 FNLA, 77 FOCAC. See Forum on China Africa Cooperation Foreign policy analysis, 2, 23–26 Forum on China-Africa Cooperation, 287, 288 Four Powers commission, 181 FPA, 24, 25. See also Foreign policy analysis Francophone, 4, 11, 79, 92, 101, 121, 163–166, 255, 256, 332 FRELIMO, 77, 138, 141, 169 French-Algerian, 67 French CFA franc, 238 Frente de Libertação de Moçambique. See FRELIMO FROLIZI, 78 Frontline States , 4, 124, 132, 141, 174, 300

G G77. See Group of 77 Game Theory, 30 GATT, 14, 52, 240, 248–252, 257 General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade. See GATT Generalised Scheme of Preferences (GSP), 252 Ghana-Guinea Union, 70, 157 Global Hunger Index, 320 Global North, 100, 257, 317, 333

INDEX

Global South, 14, 22, 52, 69, 93, 114, 170, 243, 266, 317, 333 Good Offices Commission OAU, 172 Government of Sudan, 222 Gowon, Yakubu, Maj. Gen., 214 Greater Hanish Island, 182 Greater Somalia, 82, 171, 194, 202, 205, 208, 209, 212, 306 Great Powers, 116, 195 Green Zone Iraq, 34 Group Areas Act, 120 Group of 77, 238 Groupthink, 41, 42, 302 H Hague Conventions, 63 The Havana Charter for the International Trade Organisation (ITO), 249 Hausas, 201, 214 Heads of State and Government summit, 183 Heads of States and Governments, 5, 73, 115, 119 Hilton Young Commission, 135 HIPCs, 289 Horn of Africa, 286 Houphouët-Boigny. See Houphouet-Boigny, Felix Houphouet-Boigny, Felix, 66, 124 Human Development Report (HDR), 248 Hussein, Saddam, 32 I IAFS. See India Africa Forum Summit ICC, 13, 32, 33, 194, 304, 326–330. See also International Criminal Court

343

ICJ, 107 ICTR. See International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda IGAD, 14, 157, 158, 184, 223, 224, 245, 309, 330 IGADD, 158, 173, 184, 223 IGADSOM IGAD Mission to Somalia, 14, 330 Igbos, 201, 213, 214, 216, 218 IGOs, 20, 62, 105, 156, 160, 162, 163, 186, 223, 236, 257, 275, 316 Inácio Lula da Silva, Luiz Brazilian President, 269 India, 8, 52, 53, 68, 111, 127, 177, 198, 213, 224, 232, 234, 243, 265, 266, 269, 270, 273, 275, 277–284, 290, 305, 321 India Africa Forum Summit, 283, 284 Indo-Kenyan Trade Agreement, 284 Inter-African Conference, 121 Interahamwe, Hutus, 219 Intergovernmental Authority on Development, 158 Inter-Governmental Authority on Drought and Development, 158 International Committee of the Red Cross, 105 International Court of Justice, 80 International Criminal Court, 12, 325, 328–330 International Criminal Court Statute. See International Criminal Court International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda, 12 International Trade Organization, 249 IR International relations, 6, 22–25, 45, 52 Islamic Courts Union, 308, 312 Italian East Africa, 179

344

INDEX

J Janjaweed, 219 JCPOA, 21, 52 Joint Integrated Technical Assistance Programme (JITAP), 250 Jonathan, Goodluck, 40 Just War theory, vii K Kagera War. See Uganda–Tanzania War Katanga, 89, 90, 117, 154, 185, 193, 202, 217, 218, 241 KDF Kenya Defense Forces, 52 Keïta, Modibo, 122, 272 Kennan, George F., 27 Kenya Colony, 67, 70, 83, 119, 185, 195, 206, 235 Kenya/Tanzania US embassy bombings, 312 Kenyatta, Jomo, 7, 33, 36, 101, 137, 175, 231, 280, 281, 301, 311, 329, 330 Kigali Accord, 253 Kikuyu, 328 King Leopold II, 232, 235 Kinshasa Summit, 216 Kissinger, Henry, 27, 141 Koitalel arap Samoei, 63 Kony 2012, 313 Korea-Africa Summit, 283 L L’Afrique-Équatoriale française (French Equatorial Africa), 11 Lake Tana, 9 LDCs, 252, 283, 289 League of Nations, 63, 105, 146 LegCo. See Legislative Council Legislative Council, 85, 88, 279

Lenin Peace Prize, 272 Lomé Convention(s), 240, 241, 252 LoN. See League of Nations Lord’s Resistance Army, 219, 312, 313 Lula. See Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva Lumumba, Patrice, 195, 234 Lusaka Declaration of the Commonwealth on Racism and Racial Prejudice, 127 Lusaka Manifesto, 125–128 Lusophone, 4, 166, 332 M Machakos Protocol, 222 Majimbo, 206, 207, 231 Major power(s). See Great Powers Mandate Territory, 71, 85, 88 Mare nostrum, 171 Mariam, Mengistu Haile, 170 Marxist, 20, 138, 181, 240 Mau Mau. See Mau Mau rebellion Mau Mau rebellion, 208 Menelik I, 170 Menelik II, 9, 62, 170, 178 MFN, 249, 250, 284 Millennium Development Goals (MDGs), 248 Ministerial Council, 86 MNCs Multi-National Companies, 2, 251 Mo Ibrahim Foundation, 13 Mombasa Republican Council, 83, 314 Monrovia Group Monrovia, 11, 66, 72, 93 Mount Kilimanjaro, 82–84 Moussa Faki, 5 Movement for the Emancipation of the Niger Delta (MEND), 314 MPLA, 77, 141 Mubarak, Hosni, 223, 312

INDEX

N Naivasha Accords, 221 NAM. See Non-Aligned Movement Nasser, Gamal Abdel, 69, 108, 131, 238 National Dialogue Conference on Peace Issues, 223 National interest, 20, 30–33, 38 NATO, 8, 49, 77, 105, 140, 169, 274, 276, 277, 286, 289, 301, 305, 306, 308, 310 Negus of Showa, 62, 178 Nehru, Jawaharlal, 10, 68, 69, 238, 280 NEPAD, 13, 243, 270 New International Economic Order, 159, 239, 257 NIBMAR, 133 NIEO. See New International Economic Order Nigerian Civil War. See Biafra War Nigeria-Niger Joint Commission on Cooperation, 87 Nkosazana Dlamini-Zuma, 5 Nkrumah, Kwame, 7, 64–66, 70, 79, 84, 85, 88, 90, 91, 94, 101, 117, 118, 122, 136, 138–140, 144, 146, 155, 255, 272 Non-Aligned Movement, 10, 11, 115, 132, 238, 269 North African region North Africa, 3 Northern Frontier District, 172, 202 Northern Rhodesia, 135 Nyerere, 7, 11, 70, 81, 84, 87, 101, 136, 140, 141, 146, 162, 174, 211, 212, 282, 301

O OAU Cairo Summit, 184 OAU Charter, 173

345

OAU’s Liberation Committee, 173. See also African Liberation Committee OAU Summit, 84, 87, 128, 282 OAU summit meeting, 237, 243 Obama, Barack H. U.S. President, 34 Obote, Milton, 125, 126, 212, 282 OCAM, 93, 157, 159 Ocampo Six, 33 Odumegwu-Ojukwu, Chukwuemeka Eastern Region Military Governor and Biafra’s ‘leader’, 213 OECD, 8, 251, 252 Ogaden, 15, 154, 166, 169–173, 175, 204, 207, 212, 218, 309 region (Ethiopia), 169 Ogaden Liberation Front, 171 Ogaden National Liberation Front, 171 Ogaden Republican Army, 171 Ogaden War, 15, 154, 166, 169–173, 175, 212 Operation ATALANTA, 274, 275 Operation Entebbe, 312 Organisation of African, Caribbean and Pacific States. See Africa, Caribbean and Pacific States Organizational behavior model, 35 Organizational processes model, 33 Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries, 32 Organization of the Islamic Conference, 307 Orkoiyot , 63

P PAC, 78, 132, 141 PAFMECA, 71 PAFMECSA, 73, 93 PAIGC, 77

346

INDEX

Pan-African Pan-Africanism, ix, 67, 70, 71, 90, 186, 244, 270 Pan-African Congresses, 65, 102 Pan-Africanist, 7, 64, 65, 68, 79, 101, 132, 155, 166, 301 Pan-Africanist leaders, 7, 166 Panchsheel Treaty, 68 Panel of the Wise, 326 Paris Climate Accords, 21 Peace and Security Council (AU)/(PSC), 184, 326 Peace Corps Volunteers, 13, 285 PFLP, 174, 175 Point Four, 245 Poliheuristic choice theory. See Poliheuristic Model Poliheuristic model, 46 Poliheuristic theory, 46–48 Population Registration Act, 127 post-Cold War period, 15 Prospect/loss aversion, 44 Putnam, Robert, 6

Q Queen Victoria, 83

R R2P. See Responsibility to Protect Rational Actor, 25, 28 Rational Actor Model/Theory, 27, 28 Rational Choice Model. See Rational Actor Rational Choice Theory. See Rational Actor Model/Theory Realist theory realims, 20 RECs, 157, 254–256. See also Regional Economic Communities Regional Economic Communities

RECs, 8, 16, 65, 156, 157, 159, 231, 255, 257, 331, 332 Republic of Benin attempted breakaway Republic SW of Nigeria, 215 Republic of Biafra, 213 Republic of China Taiwan, 108 Republic of South Africa, 120 Resolution 1514, 74, 111, 114, 141, 142 Responsibility to Protect, 13, 184, 218, 289, 310, 321, 325, 326, 329, 330 Rhodesia, 4, 9, 67, 74, 77, 82, 114, 126, 131, 133–146, 154, 162, 163, 177, 195, 233, 249, 250, 301, 302 Road and Bridge Initiative (RBI), 288 Rome Statute, 12, 13, 328, 330. See also International Criminal Court Rubatino Shipping Company, 177 Russia-Africa Summit and Economic Forum, 274 Rwanda genocide, 62, 183, 234, 273, 300, 301 S SADC, 157, 245 Saddam. See Hussein, Saddam Sahel, 3, 116, 121, 130, 156, 305, 306 Sahrawi Arab Democratic Republic, 5 Sars-Cov-2. See COVID-19 Seattle Round, 251 Second Ogaden War, 174 Second Sudanese Civil War, 219, 221, 222 Second Sudanese War, 219 Security Council, 110 Sékou Touré, Ahmed, 122, 156, 272 Shaba, 89, 241

INDEX

Shared Awareness and Deconfliction (SHADE), 275 Shifta war, 206, 209, 210, 212 Sirte Declaration (2002), 242 Slavery, 22, 53, 107, 108, 121, 235, 266, 267, 290 Smith, Ian, 4 Sobat, 9 South Africa, 3, 9, 15, 65, 67, 71, 74, 75, 77, 80, 91, 103, 109, 111–114, 119, 120, 122–137, 139, 141, 143, 145, 146, 155, 162, 163, 169, 179, 195, 225, 235, 249, 250, 253, 269, 270, 272, 276, 278–281, 283, 286, 301, 302, 316, 324, 328, 332 Southern Rhodesia, 74, 133, 135, 136, 138, 139, 142, 143, 145 South Sudan, 5, 85, 88, 193, 194, 200, 202, 218, 219, 222, 223, 225, 256, 289, 312 Soviet Union, 115, 117 Special United Nation Fund for Economic Development, 246 Speke Gulf, 83 SPLA, 200, 219, 221, 222. See also Sudan Peoples’ Liberation Army SSA. See Sub-Saharan Africa St. Augustine. See Augustine of Hippo Structural Adjustment Program, 14, 237, 241, 250 Sub-Saharan Africa (SSA), 3, 80, 122, 130, 155, 167, 233, 240, 320 Sudan Peoples’ Liberation Army, 220, 221 Sudan People’s Liberation Movement, 222 Suez Crisis, 69, 116 Summit meeting. See OAU summit meeting SUNFED, 246, 247, 257

347

Sustainable Development Goals, 248, 321, 331 SWANU, 78 SWAPO, 78, 141 T Tanzania-Zambia Railway (TAZARA), 285 Terra nullius , 64, 177, 234 TICAD, 283 Tigray People’s Liberation Front, 181 Tit for tat, 30 TNCs, 251 TPP Trans-Pacific Partnership, 21, 52 Transitional Federal Government (TFG), 223, 309 Transparency International, 13 Treaty of Pelindaba, 316 Treaty of Uccialli, 177 Treaty of Wuchale Treaty of Uccialli, 62 Trump, Donald U.S. President, 34 Trusteeship Council, 107, 119 U UANC, 78 UAR. See United Arab Republic UDHR, 109 UDI, 75, 136–138, 140, 141, 144, 162, 163, 225, 302 Uganda–Tanzania War, 167, 174–176 Uhuru. See Kenyatta, Jomo ‘Ujamaa’, 86 UMA, 156 Umkhonto we Sizwe, 77 UNAMIR, 273 UN Charter, 75, 108, 112, 119, 125, 145, 238 UNCTAD

348

INDEX

UN Conference on Trade and Development, 238 UNDP. See United Nations Development Programme UNECA, 68, 157, 159, 166, 243–245, 254, 257, 307, 316 UN Economic and Social Council (ECOSOC), 243 UN Economic Commission for Africa, 68. See also UNECA UNEP, 302, 316 UNFCCC, 317 UN Four Power Commission, 180 UNGA UN General Assembly, 74, 107, 109, 111, 115, 141–143, 145, 245, 247 UN Habitat, 302, 317 Unified Task Force. See UNITAF Unilateral Declaration of Independence, 133 Union Africaine et Malgache, 67 Union Minière du Haut-Katanga, 117 Union of African States, 70 Union of South Africa, 63, 64, 107, 111, 112, 119, 120 Union of West African Socialist Republics, 70 UNITA, 77 UNITAF, 307 United Arab Republic Egypt and Syria, 69, 70, 129 United Nations, 12, 64, 67, 68, 73–75, 80, 84, 87, 100, 102, 104–107, 109–115, 118, 119, 126, 129, 135, 141–145, 157, 179, 222, 244–248, 250, 254, 273, 275, 282, 304, 312, 316, 317, 325, 329 United Nations Development Programme, 245, 248

Universal Declaration of Human Rights, 73, 74, 106, 109, 145 Universal Declaration of Independence. See UDI Universal Negro Improvement Association, 65 UN Mission in Ethiopia and Eritrea, 184 UN Mission to the Congo (MONUSCO), 326 UNOSOM, 307 UN Resolution 181 (1947), 129 UN’s Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Racial Discrimination, 123 UNSC Resolution 1593, 288 UNSC Resolution 1679, 288 UNSC Resolution 1970, 289 UNSC Resolution 1973 (2011), 275, 289 UN Secretariat, 107 UN Security Council, 107, 108, 111, 119, 142–145, 270, 289, 305, 307, 310, 325, 326 UN Special Court for Sierra Leone, 12 UN’s Special Fund (SUNFED), 16 UN + stabilisation mission in Mali (MINUSMA), 326 UN stabilization mission to the DRC, 326 UN Trusteeship Council, 107 Uruguay Round, 250 USAID, 39, 323 USIA (US Information Agency), 114, 323 Uti possidetis , 167, 168, 184 W WAEMU. See West African Economic and Monetary Union Wagalla Massacre, 209

INDEX

WAMZ. See West African Monetary Zone Washington Consensus, 8, 14, 22, 237, 242, 250, 252, 322 West African Economic and Monetary Union, 157, 255, 256 West African Monetary Zone, 255 West Africa Squadron (Royal Navy), 267 Westphalia Treaty of, 37 Westphalian, viii, 21, 53, 63, 78, 89, 199, 324 World Bank and IMF. See Bretton Woods Institutions World Bank Group, 13

349

World Islamic Courts, 174, 209 Worldwide Governance Indicators, 13 WTO, 52, 248, 250–252, 257

Y Yohannes, Ras Mengesha, 178 Yoruba, 214

Z ZANU, 78, 137, 138, 141, 272 ZAPU, 78, 137–139, 141, 272 Zenawi, Meles, 182 Zheng He, 284 ZIPA, 78