Civilians displaced by fighting in Muhajiriya, at the United
Nations-African Union Mission in Darfur campsite in Zamzam, North Darfur
in this 2009 photo. The African Union always sides with the countries
threatened with secession. For example, the AU sent a 7,000-strong force
to Darfur in Sudan. PHOTO | REUTERS
To secede or not to secede? For Peter Kaluma, Member of
Parliament for Homa Bay Town in Kenya, secession is the way to go as
captured in a Bill he has sponsored.
Several other MPs belonging to the National Super Alliance (Nasa) — a coalition of opposition parties — share this view.
Legitimate or otherwise, it is not an easy path to take as various examples on the continent show.
In
some quarters, the renewed push for secession in Kenya is considered an
existential threat. The call started with the Mombasa Republican
Council (MRC) in 1999 and was later picked up by economist Dr David Ndii
before Hassan Joho and Amos Kingi, the Mombasa and Kilifi governors,
respectively, joined in.
However, the push for
secession is not new in Kenya. Shortly after Independence, there was a
clamour for the northeastern part of the country (then referred to as
the Northern Frontier District) to be made part of what was popularly
known as Greater Somalia.
In the pre-colonial era,
this region comprised of what is now the Ogaden area of Ethiopia,
Djibouti, Somaliland, northern Somalia (or Puntland) and northern Kenya.
But
when Britain and Italy colonised this region, they split it to make it
governable. Northern Kenya was handed over to Nairobi shortly before
Independence. However, this did not please the Republic of Somalia,
which gained self rule in 1961.
Shifta war
Secession
movements in Africa generally result from feelings of exclusion. For
example, the Somali leaders in Kenya were angry that their interests
were neglected by colonial authorities, and they were not confident that
these would be guaranteed by authorities in independent Kenya.
This
led to what is now known as the Shifta war during which a vicious
guerrilla campaign against the police and army went on for more than
four years.
In Sudan, the call for secession, which
resulted in a long-drawn out conflict, was over several issues,
including Khartoum’s long-standing neglect of the South; the
concentration of jobs, wealth, and public services in what was known as
the Arab Triangle and the government’s attempts to impose Arab culture
and Islam on the South.
Khartoum was also accused of
exploiting the South’s resources, particularly its oil, to fill
government coffers. But the Sudanese government was reluctant to let go.
The
leadership was also not willing to part with the Nile waters and the
Sudd marshlands, the region’s luxuriant soil, and its huge open range
with the greatest concentration of cattle in sub-Saharan Africa.
States
threatened by breakaway movements often resort to a military solution,
leading to full-blown conflict. For example, shortly after its secession
from Nigeria, the breakaway Republic of Biafra was attacked by
government forces.
The root causes of the secession
movement were seen to have emanated from the killing of Igbo Christians
by the Muslim Hausas. This led to the flight of tens of thousands of
Igbos to the east of the country. The community was not confident that
the then military government in Nigeria would cater for their interests.
The case of Biafra
Led
by Lt-Col Odumegwu Ojukwu, the Igbos established the Republic of
Biafra, comprising several states, on May 30, 1967. Initially, Nigeria
attempted a diplomatic effort to reunite the country. But this failed
and war broke out in July 1967.
This led to a
catastrophe in which Biafra was unable to import food, leading to the
deaths of an estimated one million people. Biafra could not sustain the
conflict, especially after the Nigerian forces captured the provincial
capital of Owerri, one of the last Biafran strongholds, on January 11,
1970. This forced Ojukwu to flee to Cote d'Ivoire. Biafra surrendered
four days later.
Kenyans calling for secession can draw
lessons — and comfort — from earlier secession movements in Ethiopia,
Darfur and South Sudan.
Supporters of the movement
were inspired by domestic political failures, high levels of perceived
corruption, lack of genuine accountability, and meagre prospects for
democratic change.
In these cases, government opponents
resorted to armed struggle. Respective governments responded with
repressive measures, such as increasing censorship, imposing emergency
laws or trying to eliminate the rebel groups by force.
For
example, after the Dergue assumed power in Ethiopia in 1975, the
country fought wars on various fronts. One such front was an ugly war
with the Oromo Liberation Front (OLF), which sought self-determination
of the Oromo people and the attendant advancement of their political,
economic, social and cultural interests.
Oromos have always argued that their rights and interests were suppressed by the Ethiopian government.
As
if to complement their aggressive reaction to secessionists, states are
wont to use diplomatic pressure to defeat their cause. For example,
Ethiopia creatively used its support for the US-led War on Terror and a
peace agreement with Eritrea (which was accused of supporting separatist
movement in Addis Ababa) signed on December 12, 2000, to make Oromo
people’s cause ineffective.
The treaty improved
relations between the two countries and enabled the Ethiopian government
to direct more resources into fighting domestic insurgencies. At the
same time, when Ethiopia took to the frontline in the War on Terror, the
West sided with Addis Ababa in the latter’s argument that the OLF was a
terrorist group and that it deserved to be treated like other terrorist
groups.
International diplomacy
When
separatist movements become violent, they complicate the insecurity
scenario. Indeed, the push for separation by the OLF is seen to have
worsened insecurity in Kenya. This was after the group sought safe
havens in parts of Somalia and northern Kenya.
According to Jane’s Defence Weekly,
a weekly magazine that reports on military and corporate affairs, OLF
found a useful base in parts of northern Kenya because of factors such
as the country’s inability to completely pacify the area, communities
believed to be sympathetic to the OLF’s cause, and the ease of acquiring
small arms.
Although the OLF denies that it has a
presence in Kenya’s north, Ethiopia has carried out numerous
cross-border raids since 1998. This has resulted in immense suffering of
local communities, besides straining Kenya-Ethiopia relations
especially after some police officers from Kenya were abducted and
interrogated in Ethiopia a few years ago.
There are
also claims that Ethiopia has used rival ethnic groups to the Oromo,
such as the Garre, as paramilitary units at the Kenyan border, leading
to horrific ethnic clashes in the Marsabit area.
International diplomacy seems to be rabidly against secession movements.
In
1979, for example, Kenya and Ethiopia signed a 10-year treaty of
co-operation to fight insecurity. Kenya’s camaraderie with Ethiopia was
strengthened when then president Daniel Moi joined his Ethiopian
counterpart Mengistu Haile Mariam to demand that Somalia denounce any
territorial claim it had to Kenya, Ethiopia, and Djibouti and pay
reparations for damage caused during the Ogaden war.
Years
later, the OLF came under considerable pressure to participate in the
2005 elections in Ethiopia but it boycotted them, claiming they were
rigged. But it did express a willingness to talk with the Ethiopian
government.
How does the international community react to secessionist movements?
When
Kenyan opposition leader Raila Odinga visited the US recently, he
denied support for the calls for secession. Seemingly, Mr Odinga was
aware that the international community does not take kindly to such
movements.
Indeed, there is evidence that states tend
to support stabilisation and, by extension, the respective governments
faced by internal secession-driven conflicts. For example, when Sudan
was fighting the SPLM, the US and European Union maintained co-operation
with the government in the War on Terror while France gave assistance
to the Central African Republic and Chad against the rebels in these
countries.
External interests
On
its part, the African Union has not only ruled out support for
secessionists across the continent, but has in the past joined hands
with the United Nations to send peacekeepers to countries facing
secession-driven conflict. For example, the AU sent a 7,000-strong force
to Darfur in Sudan.
China has shown, in word and deed,
that it has no heart for separatist movements as it blocked imposition
of serious economic sanctions on Sudan at the height of the Darfur
conflict. Commencing in February 2003, the war in Darfur was believed to
result in the killing of more than 200,000 and the displacement of 2.5
million others.
Secession movements tend to draw in
other players who are often driven, not by the need to restore order and
stability, but by their own interests. This creates a murky
international-relations scenario that results in the trading of blame
and counter-blame.
According to the Premium Times
of Nigeria, recently-declassified war-time memos compiled by the US
Central Investigation Agency shed light on how external interests
largely shaped the atrocious Biafra war.
The documents
say that France, Gabon, Tanzania and Ivory Coast openly backed Biafra
while Britain and Russia (then the USSR) aided Nigeria to thwart
Biafra’s exit. France is said to have sent $30 million worth of material
to Biafra, and lent the former Ivory Coast president, Felix
Houphouet-Boigny $3 million to aid Biafra operations.
France’s interest was to get access to oil fields there.
“France
supported Biafra because of the oil,” Jean Mauricheau-Beaupre, former
French secretary general for African and Malagasy affairs, was quoted in
the documents.
The country hoped to acquire British
and American oil concessions in the oil-rich Niger Delta. On its part,
the Organisation of African Unity, which preceded the African Union,
supported the federal government of Nigeria in 1969 and regarded the
civil war as an internal question that needed to be solved within its
framework.
A similar scenario replayed itself in Sudan
where the Darfur secession-inspired crisis attracted a diversity of
interests including Iran, the US, the EU, Eritrea, China and
multilateral bodies like the African Union, European Union and the Arab
League.
According to an Italian news service report of
December 23, 2006, Iran — which had warmed up to Khartoum —was accused
of trying to promote its brand of Shia Islam in a country dominated by
Sunni Muslims.
In addition, the US was accused by
Eritrea of obstructing peace negotiations in Darfur while Eritrea was
accused of supporting rebels in Darfur and Ethiopia.
Back
to what those calling for secession in Kenyan need to consider. For
one, the country is a slice of the planet’s real estate that is the
object of international envy.
It is one of the very
few countries on earth endowed with the entire world’s different climate
systems; it is relatively vast, with over 58 million hectares, out of
which slightly over five million hectares have been put under
cultivation. From this land springs an elaborate network of surface and
groundwater systems; mineral resources and a biological diversity
unsurpassed by most other countries of the world.
In a situation where the centre can no longer hold, the jackals will be watching.
True
to what American social critic and political activist Noam Chomsky
terms “military humanism,” different forces are usually deployed
ostensibly to restore peace and order. This ends in a prolonged
conflict, enabling foreign entities to keep “harvesting” resources in
the countries concerned without paying a dime.
Kenya’s
best bet is to settle its problems as a unitary state. There are many
historical injustices whose resolutions have been frustrated by the
political elite. The monumental crisis being experienced in Kenya today
has created the right conditions for a complete redress of the
injustices.
Gatu wa Mbaria is a freelance journalist and co-author of The Big Conservation Lie.
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