Masisi, Ramaphosa grow cold feet over Jihadist conflict in Mozambique
Wits University Professor says mission too complex for SADC Cabo Delgado is the gas fight of the century
The last minute cancellation of the Extraordinary Summit of yesterday’s SADC Organ on Politics, Defence and Security, has attracted criticism to leaders of the regional economic bloc.
The postponement was caused by the absence of the Organ’s chairperson, President Dr. Mokgweetsi Masisi who is currently in quarantine after a close member of his staff tested positive for COVID- 19. Meantime, the incoming chairperson of the Organ, President Cyril Ramaphosa of South Africa got held up at the Zondo Commission.
Professor Anthoni Van Nieuwkerk, of Wits University School of Governance, Centre for Defense and Security was at pains to believe that the postponement was due to logistical problems. The Professor was worried that the longer the decisions are postponed the worse it would become for the people of Cabo Delgado.
He said that after the recent attacks in Palma, the insurgents had captured large amounts of fuel, weapons and food which will enable them to regroup to prepare for attacks elsewhere.
Speculating on political reasons for the postponement, Van Nieuwkerk posited two possible reasons.
The first is that the military intervention by the SADC standby force will be costly. “I wonder who is going to pay for this”.
He said if there is no money, SADC cannot deploy properly and the last thing they want to do is to send personnel staff and troops and they get stuck after a short time. The second reason is the struggle to come up with the package that is appropriate for the conditions in Cabo Delgado because it is far away and traverses sea and land.
He also speculated that the Mozambican government and President Felipe Jacinto Nyusi may not be willing to accept an intervention by a multinational force.
“Is he prepared to cede sovereignty so that others can come in and clean the mess in his backyard? Is he prepared to concede that he is not able to do that himself ”?
As for the involvement of Portugal and USA in the Mozambican conflict, the Professor said they play a very minor role of “training or maybe sharing some intelligence”.
In fact he suspects that the SADC Intervention Force is a Trojan horse to slip in foreign forces, since SADC does not have the requisite wherewithal to fight the extremists and stop “this nonsense of beheading people in villages”.
Therefore SADC Intervention Force would be an excuse to ask for planes from the USA, for the French to supply ships, the Russians to bring some weapons and the Germans to do satellite imaging for us.
“We ask all these foreigners to bring the technical equipment that we need and before we know it we will have a multinational force that is not only SADC, but will be SADC plus”.
He said this is the more likely scenario because all these foreign powers have real interests to protect in what is happening in Cabo Delgado.
“It is the gas fight of the century, it is huge, the French, Americans and Europeans are all involved”. The conflict could also include the SADC plus, plus force drawing in Turkey, UAE, Gulf States, Saud Arabia and Iran while in the meantime the problem with Jihadists, ISIS or Al- Qaida which is messing up the East Coast of Africa, continues unabated.
“In my view, the Mozambican government might not be able to manage a SADC plus plus situation. I think this thing is so complicated so much that this might be the reason for the delay”.
Van Nieuwkerk believes the Mozambique conflict is very important in the history of Southern Africa and that if we send the wrong force, if the package is not well designed and the intervention force gets stuck, “we will end up like the Nigerians or Somali government which have accepted the sophisticated support from the Americans and others, yet violent extremism is growing every day”.
Once that happens a part of Southern Africa will look like a part of the Horn of Africa, he warned. But if we get the package right, he said we can be able to control the insurgency and prevent it from expanding so that Cabo Delgado does not become an ISIS stronghold or internationalised.
“If we get it wrong, we will be architects of further instability and destabilisation and that will be unforgivable,” he warned.
But what would constitute a right package? He said SADC needs a counter terrorist strategy to prevent violent extremists whether they are criminals, locals or warlords, foreign jihadists or a combination.
“You have to prevent them from sowing instability in the region by using terror tactics. Secondly there are 80000 people and by December, there will be one ( 1) million people running away from the conflict.
“You need to design part of the package that will facilitate humanitarian aid. The third one is you have to think medium and long term, have a de- radicalisation strategy in place not only to counter violent extremism but you have to prevent it from growing.
“This is not a military solution, people need jobs stability, security, services good governance and a corruption free administration to manage the situation in Cabo Delgado”. He said investors of the gas in Cabo Delgado also need to show that they care about the people, as the locals need to be employed to build the infrastructure instead of importing South Africa or Whites to go and do the job.
Finally, the longer term strategy to prevent violent extremism from taking root is to promote good governance, democracy, development and human rights.
Asked if the insurgents are locals or foreigners, the Professor posited that people are disillusioned and angry because of local grievances.
Some have been left in the lurch for long; there is suddenly talk of gas exploration and sudden wealth which is being exploited by the ruling elites and their friends who develop the infrastructure.
There are also criminal networks at play as well as drug smugglers. It is the complexity of the situation that the Professor believes is forcing SADC to take a step back to design the right package.