Maina wa Njuguna
Has the Sahel region always been this volatile? It seems like the Islamic insurgencies, coups, or failed coups, are un ending menace headlining news every week.
Terror visited upon innocent civilians organized by extreme gangs linked to al-Qaida and the Islamic State have continued to wreck havoc to people just trying to live their lives.
The epicenter of these insurgencies are in the Alliance of Sahel States (AES) region, namely Burkina Faso, Mail, and Niger.
THE GENESIS
Let’s take a trip down the memory lane. How was the region fairing before the toppling of the Libyan government and the eventual murder of the long-time leader, Muammar Gaddafi in October 2011?
After eight months of civil war in Libya, rebels from the eastern city of Benghazi were posed to win with the intervention of NATO under the command of the former US President Barak Obama. NATO’S airstrikes, tipped the scales against Gaddafi’s forces.
LIBYA: THE FAILED STATE
That NATO intervention was very decisive in toppling Gaddafi’s rule which became the genesis of instability in the country that spilled over the southern bordering countries of the Sahel region.
Wikipedia /Courtesy/
The entrenching insecurities are now threatening to go beyond the Sahel region into some the of West African States.
SAHEL PRIOR THE LIBYAN CATASTROPHE IN 2011
A history of ethnic tensions and conflicts between nomadic Tuareg and farming communities had characterized the region. Large swaths of ungoverned areas because of weak governments largely concentrated around major towns was ripe for terrorist invasions.
Poverty and marginalized communities had been building distrust and divisions served as invitation to foreign insurgencies seeking accommodation in Africa.
The Islamic caliphate that had terrorized some eastern countries of the Middle East was disintegrating 2017 onwards after a thorough thumping by the US forces. Some loosely affiliated individuals and groups that had alliances fled to the Sahel region as the caliphate met its demise in 2019.
Some remnants of the Islamic terrorists groups, including al-Qaeda found homage, including forging partnerships with African Islamic terrorists groups which have continued to destabilize the region.
LIBYAN GOVERNMENT COLLAPSE SPILL OVER:
- Weapon proliferation
- Rise of armed and terrorist clusters
- Porous borders & ungoverned areas has led to free flow of insugent and mercenaries groups
- Humanitarian crisis and displacement
- Transnational criminal enterprises
There have been at least 11 coup attempts, some successful between 2020 – 2024 in Burkina Faso, Chad, Guinea, Mali, Niger and Sudan.The region is a total mess especially in Sudan where the civil war between Sudan Armed Forces (SAF), and the notorious paramilitary group Rapid Support Forces (RSF) has killed over 40,000 and displaced over 12 million people.
WHAT ARE WE TO DO?
The fractured continent thanks to the 1884 Berlin conference that partitioned Africa which has been sustained by inept, myopic African leaders continues to give and give domestic and foreign organized bandits, whose interests are contrary to Africans’ well-being.
Top of my mind is The “Africa Corps”, formerly Wagner Group which purports to provide security to some tyrant African leaders in return for access to Africa’s minerals wealth.
A disunited Africa is a weak continent. That is evidenced from Uganda’s president Yoweri Museveni’s own words of what went down in Libya in 2011.
Six African Presidents on a mission to mediate the Libyan crisis were ordered by NATO to return from where they came from. Think about that for a moment 🤔.
The shear level of arrogance, the lack of accountability speaks volumes. Africans at the end of the day are to take the blame for this.
Six African heads of States, on an African mission, in Africa being dismissed by a foreign alliance on African soil!
If Africa is to learn anything about the necessity of unity, I couldn’t think of a better illustration than this. I don’t believe that long lasting solutions to Africa’s challenges can come from outside and be adopted successfully.
We Africans are the solution to our own shortcomings. We have to initiate our own road map to solutions, maybe partner where possible with well-wishers, to implement our plans. Up until we take that to heart, and demonstrate by actions, the light will remains agonizingly far off.
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