By Mwalimu George Ngwane
The concept of “Wise” in the traditional African point of view is linked to how age and experience relate to the ingredients of wisdom and counselling. Equipped with foresight, moral authority, respect, self discipline and moderation, wise connotes a high sense of maturity often attributed to the Elderly and a high flavour of human glue needed to bond conflicting parties. The concept dates back to the village male chauvinist tradition whereby old men were required to sit under a tree during moonlight to take decisions on the village often by consensus in what is now called “the palaver theory”. The proverb ‘what an old man can see seated, a young man cannot see standing’ lends credence to the confidence bestowed on the elderly in Africa hence the motivation of the African Union to establish an institution known as The Panel of the Wise (The Panel) within the Peace and Security Council and the fundamental urge to solve African problems through African solutions.
Modalities setting up The Panel were adopted by the Peace and Security Council at its 100th meeting held on 12th December 2007. The Panel was then inaugurated on 18th December 2007. Five members are drawn from various segments of society and from the five sub regions in member states based on their integrity and independence, no active political office at the time of their appointments for a period of three years renewable once. Regional representation is key. Pioneer members since 2007 include Salim Ahmed Salim from East Africa, Ahmed Ben Bella from North Africa, Miguel Trovoada representing Central Africa, Mrs Brigalia Bam representing South Africa and Mrs Elizabeth Pognon representing West Africa. Their mandate ends this year.
While the general mission of the Peace and Security Council is to respond to and manage conflicts in Africa, the Panel has four main tasks: Conflict Prevention or Preventive Diplomacy (The Panel is charged with opening channels of communication that would prevent disputes from escalating into conflict); Early warnings (The Panel carries out fact finding missions where there is a danger of conflict either breaking out or seriously escalating); Conflict Resolution (The Panel encourages conflicting parties or belligerents to the negotiating table); Conflict Settlement (The Panel enhances the implementation of Peace Agreements).
For the purposes of this article, I would like to examine some of the elements of early warning or Alert systems in Africa or what is generally considered as Continental Early Warning Systems (CEWS). Early warnings are indeed conflict factors or proximate causal factors that are latent or on the surface waiting to get open and in most cases transform into physical or violent conflicts. They are mostly imbedded in structural, institutional or systemic domains manifesting themselves in: horizontal inequalities (poverty gap between regions in the same country); vertical inequalities (poverty gap between individuals of the same country); constitutional manipulation as in some countries where constitutions are engineered to exclude, annex or annihilate a segment of society leading to marginalised or vulnerable sectors or the fashionable limitless terms where Presidents abrogate the second term mandate enshrined in the Constitution; disenfranchisement of ‘enemy voters and contestants’ before elections as well as the unilateral creation of Electoral managing bodies and appointment of its members solely by the incumbent or ruling oligarchy; identity-based discrimination through ethnicisation, religion, language and gender; the temptations of transforming Republics into Monarchies or Dynasties through cosmetic democratic elections and/or official or shadow cabinets comprising family members; and lack of non-traditional security issues or basic service delivery systems like health, education, employment, housing etc.
Having existed for barely three years the Panel has been able to craft a vision based on Annual thematic Reflections. In 2008, its theme was Election-related conflict. Coming on the heels of the Kenyan election crisis in 2008, the Panel was obliged to consider this early warning factor by organising an International workshop with a cross section of the civil society and state actors in Africa in November 2008 in Nairobi, Kenya. This was a clear recognition of the role ‘pre- election management rather than post-election fire-fighting measures’ can play in the Panel’s mission of early warning signals.
More critical is the entry point in the election timeline for the Panel as this would cushion the effects of conflicts where they are sometimes bound to occur because of deep-seated animosities of various facets. In 2009, the Panel’s theme was ‘impunity, reconciliation and healing’ which necessitated a workshop in Monrovia in May 2009. While this could be regarded as a post-conflict strategy aimed at balancing peace with justice ,it also draws its inspiration from at least three dynamics of the indigenous knowledge system of Africa which insists on a)‘reconciliation without bitterness’ or as Prof Ali Mazrui puts it ‘Africa’s short memory of hate’ b) ‘reconciliation with forgiveness’ as experienced in the ‘Indaba’ system in Zimbabwe, the ‘gacaca’ system in Rwanda, the ‘pitso’ system in Lesotho and the restorative rather than retributive justice system propounded in Africa and popularised by Archbishop Emeritus Desmond Tutu; c) the importance of good neighbourliness which the South Africans call ‘ubuntu’ ,the Beti in Cameroon call ‘mbangsuma’ and as Salim Ahmed Salim says ‘You can choose your friends but you cannot choose your neighbours’.
Logistically it would be absolutely unimaginable that the Panel would arrest crisis before they escalate in a conflict-prone continent like Africa but there are some recommendations I would like to proffer in the direction of early warning systems:
Cooperative Partnership
Broaden the Panel to include a Pool of civil society or national actors and International NGOs who are in the best position to identify Alert systems and react to them. Indeed civil society groups can serve as Information gatherers and Advisory support units during fact-finding missions of the Panel. CSOs can also serve as sensitisation units in the various communities after the Panel must have officially finished their task (Local ownership). This Recommendation is covered by Article IV (5) of the Protocol establishing the Panel “If the Panel considers it necessary, it may invite resource persons,experts,institutions or individuals, to attend a meeting in order to assist the Panel in its deliberation on specific issues”.
Such a meeting should be a platform to develop a Resource Person Data base from each country or sub-region and establish an Inventory of potential trouble spots. Complementarily, an outreach programme and open communication policy should be developed wherein individuals can submit queries and observations on potential conflicts to the Panel. In this case the Panel would serve as a Strategic Coordinator.
Citizen-centric CEWS
The Panel would have to lay emphasis on Structural, Systemic or Institutional domains of citizen-centric CEWS especially on Good-enough Governance and Democratic Development. These two components are in my opinion in-built early warning tools in that: a) Good-enough Governance focuses on humanitarian interventions hence the opportunity to address basic service delivery systems that are often in contestation among citizens within geo-political spaces);b) While Democracy quite often limits itself to the choice of political models (multiparty, single party, no party,militocracy and even monarchies) and electoral laws hence restricting its scope to what happens DURING elections, Democratic development concentrates on what happens BETWEEN elections i.e. how basic human needs(water,electricity,health,education,poverty,unemployment,resource-based agitations etc) are met. Africa is caught in a vicious web of elections whose outcome is often politician-centred rather than a virtuous cycle of development whose outcome should be citizen-centred. Erratic condemnations of bullet coup d’états in Africa by the African Union without recourse to finding out the root causes of dissent (Conflict Transformation) or the superficial luxury of ‘negative peace’ arising from ballot coup d’états under civilian regimes would not provide lasting solutions to Peace.
Culture of Peace Education
The Panel should encourage member states to introduce Peace and Citizenship Education in schools- a kind of ‘Culture of Peace Programme’ that UNESCO advocated some twenty years ago but that has not made considerable inroads.
Continental Early Warning Index (CEWI)
The Panel would need to avoid ‘the culture of secrecy’ and be more proactive by using various communication channels as alert systems or whistle blowing measures for conflicts in the continent-a kind of Continental Early Warning Index (CEWI). It could do this by opening an area on the African Union website illustrating Conflict stages in the continent; it could be allowed to present this CEWI during Heads of State General Assembly or it could have its own newsletter cataloguing potential trouble spots in the continent and where necessary suggestions to prevent them from escalating . This is different from a ‘name and shame’ list.
Finally, whenever early warnings are adequately addressed they provide a strong platform for Conflict Prevention. This is a measure towards minimising rather than eradicating violent conflicts in the continent. The Panel should be seen as a complimentary rather than an absolute player in this mission because emerging conflicts within countries are often more sensitive to address due to the sovereign shell that most countries still carry on them and the razor thin line that often exists between early warning signals and full blown conflicts. To quote one of the members of the Panel, Mrs Bam “we cannot change the whole of the large continent”. Yet there is a case for the Panel having their work cut out for them if they receive submissions from individuals, adopt a multi-layered approach in consultations with both state and non-state actors and carry out fact finding missions before and not after the crises.
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