Something significant and positive just happened in the Middle East, and most Americans are not aware of it. The United Arab Emirates, under the banner of a Saudi-led coalition, late last month delivered a major blow to the most lethal Al Qaeda group on the planet—Al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula (AQAP), the primary Islamic extremist group operating in Yemen.
The Sunni Gulf states are often painted in the Western media as shying away from a fight, not being capable of a fight and not willing to deal with terrorists and extremists in their midst. The UAE operation in Yemen proved that none of these characterizations are true of Abu Dhabi.
AQAP has long been, and still is, a threat to the American homeland. The past three attempted terrorist attacks in the United States by an outside group were conducted by AQAP—the 2009 attempt to bring down an airliner flying to Detroit by the so-called underwear bomber, the 2010 attempt to bring down U.S.-flagged cargo planes flying from the Middle East to the United States by hiding bombs in printer cartridges, and the 2011 plot to bring down a civilian airliner flying to the United States with a sophisticated suicide vest containing no metallic parts.
These plots resulted from the extensive safe haven that AQAP then enjoyed in Yemen. In 2012 and 2013, military operations by the Yemeni government, supported by U.S. counterterrorism operations, eliminated that safe haven and removed numerous AQAP leaders from the battlefield. But a civil war in Yemen that began in 2014 created a power vacuum that gave AQAP new life. Early last year, the group seized a large amount of territory, garnered thousands of new recruits, acquired caches of weapons and raised new revenues.
In the civil war, the Saudi-led coalition has been fighting on the side of the internationally recognized government of Yemen and its president, Abd Rabbu Mansour Hadi. The coalition is fighting against an Iranian-backed Yemeni militant group called the Houthis that had swept across the country in 2014, capturing the capital, Sanaa, in September 2014. The focus of the coalition has been fighting the Houthis, but over the past five months it has quietly turned its attention to the growing threat of AQAP, culminating in last month’s major operation.
On the weekend of April 23-24, the Emirati military, with the support of the Yemeni military and local Yemeni tribes, seized from AQAP the strategically important city of Mukalla and the surrounding area. Mukalla, Yemen’s fifth-largest city, hosts the country’s second largest port—from which AQAP was earning substantial revenues by taxing the shipment of goods there. The city was to be the center of AQAP’s Islamic emirate in Yemen. Its loss is a major blow to AQAP. It is the equivalent of the Islamic State losing Mosul or Raqqa.
The military operation was well planned and executed. The Emiratis worked with local Yemeni tribes to secure their support for the operation, and the Emiratis trained a cadre of Yemeni soldiers to assist in the operation. The attack itself involved choreographed air, naval and ground operations. The operation, which some thought would take weeks, took only days. And now the coalition is shifting to operations to ensure that AQAP cannot return—to include the establishment of good governance in the area. It is a textbook solution of dealing with terrorist groups that hold territory.
Degrading AQAP was in the interests of the Saudis and the Emiratis. The two countries are the primary targets of AQAP in the region. But the degradation of the group is also in the national security interests of the United States since the homeland remains target No. 1 for AQAP outside the region.
Thus, the implications of the Emirati operation are significant. It is the kind of military capability and willingness to act against terrorists that should become a model for other countries in the region. It is the kind of action that the United States should support—both with tangible assistance and public statements. And, it is the approach to dealing with terrorists holding territory that will work against other extremist groups, including the Islamic State, winning the support of local tribes, training local Sunni forces to take the fight to the enemy, and fighting ourselves where necessary.
Laws fail victims of forced, early marriage in “chauvinistic” Burkina Faso – Amnesty
Huts in the village of Bagare, Passore province, northern Burkina Faso, March 30, 2016. REUTERS/Zoe Tabary
By Kieran Guilbert | Thomson Reuters Foundation
DAKAR, April 26 (Thomson Reuters Foundation) – Burkina Faso’s marriage laws are failing girls who are forced into early marriage by their families and threatened, abused and beaten by their partners for seeking contraception, Amnesty International said on Tuesday.
Forced marriage is illegal in the West African nation, but the law applies only to state-registered marriages, rather than the religious and traditional ceremonies which account for most of Burkina Faso’s forced and early marriages, Amnesty said.
The law also states that a girl must be aged 17 or above to marry, yet half of girls aged 15 to 17 in the northern Sahel region are married, the rights group said in a report.
“Current legislation in Burkina Faso has critical gaps… leaving many women and girls unprotected and unsupported,” the report said.
Burkina Faso has the sixth highest rate of early marriage in Africa, with one in 10 girls married by the age of 15 and more than half married by 18, according to the United Nations children’s agency UNICEF.
Families often marry off girls to improve family alliances and social status, or in return for goods, money and services.
Some areas of Burkina Faso also have the practice of ‘Pog-lenga’ or ‘bonus woman’, where a bride brings her niece to the husband’s family as an extra girl to be married, Amnesty said.
“I did not want to marry the man (her aunt’s husband). My aunt told me ‘if you flee, we will destroy you’,” Amnesty quoted 15-year-old Celine as saying, one of 379 women and girls interviewed by the human rights group.
While the government and donors subsidise the cost of contraception, many married women and girls still struggle to buy it as they cannot afford it, do not have control of their income and are prevented by their partners, Amnesty said.
Fewer than one in six women and girls in Burkina Faso use contraception, dramatically increasing the risk of unwanted and sometimes high-risk pregnancies, according to Amnesty.
At least 2,800 women in Burkina Faso die in childbirth every year, a figure that could be reduced by one-third with better access to birth control, the report said.
“There is a male chauvinistic culture which says: ‘I will decide in the place of the woman’,” Gaetan Mooto, West Africa researcher at Amnesty, told the Thomson Reuters Foundation.
“Even when women have the money for contraception, they don’t have the control over their own bodies,” Mooto added.
The government of Burkina Faso was not immediately available for comment.
(Reporting By Kieran Guilbert, Editing by Ros Russell. Please credit the Thomson Reuters Foundation, the charitable arm of Thomson Reuters, that covers humanitarian news, women’s rights, trafficking, corruption and climate change. Visit news.trust.org)
The Worst Dictatorship You’ve Never Heard Of
Gambian President Yahya Jammeh. Part of the reason Jammeh’s government is so jittery is that it weathered a coup attempt less than two years ago. In December 2014, an unlikely band of diaspora members — including two U.S. Army veterans and a Minnesota businessman — staged an assault on the presidential palace while Jammeh was outside the country.
Since taking power in a bloodless coup in 1994, Yahya Jammeh has presided over the worst dictatorship you’ve never heard of. The eccentric Gambian president, who performs ritual exorcisms and claims to heal everything from AIDS to infertility with herbal remedies, rules his tiny West African nation through a mix of superstition and fear. State-sanctioned torture, enforced disappearances, and arbitrary executions — these are just a few of the favored tactics employed by his notorious security and intelligence services.
Elsewhere in Africa, rights advocates have increasingly lamented a plague of “third-termism” as more and more leaders move to scrap constitutional limits in order to remain in power. But in Gambia, Jammeh will probably cruise to a fifth five-year term in elections scheduled for December. That is, of course, unless the unprecedented wave of protests that began last week boil over into a full-fledged popular revolt.
Tensions have been slowly building in Gambia for years, not least because of the repressive security environment, widespread corruption, chronic food shortages, and terribly mismanaged economy. (Gambia ranks dead last in West Africa in terms of GDP per capita, the only country to experience a decline since 1994.) But Jammeh has mostly succeeded in keeping discontent in check, in part because of Gambia’s Indemnity Law — signed by the president in 2001 — occasioned by an incident the previous year in which security forces opened fire on a group of student protesters. In total, 14 people were murdered in broad daylight. The new law gave the president sweeping powers to prevent security forces from being prosecuted for quelling “unlawful assembly.”
On April 14, however, long-simmering frustrations inevitably boiled over. Scores of Gambians bravely took to the streets that day to demand electoral reforms before the December elections. Unsurprisingly, Jammeh’s riot police cut the demonstration short, roughing up protesters and firing tear gas to disperse the crowds that had gathered in a seaside suburb of the capital, Banjul.
The regime’s initial response to the protests was actually quite subdued when compared with similar events in Gambia’s past. But citizens mobilized again two days later, on April 16, staging the largest and most sustained act of public defiance against Jammeh since he seized power more than two decades ago. This time, the agitated police responded more forcefully, spraying demonstrators with live ammunition and assaulting people in the streets. In total, 55 people were reportedly arrested; many of them were brutalized in detention.
Gambia’s President Yahya Jammeh arrives at the Elysee palace to participate in the Elysee summit for peace and safety in Africa, on December 6, 2013 in Paris. AFP PHOTO/ ALAIN JOCARD (Photo credit should read ALAIN JOCARD/AFP/Getty Images)
Most shockingly, Solo Sandeng, the leader of the youth wing of Gambia’s main opposition movement, the United Democratic Party (UDP), was allegedly tortured to death while in state custody. After news of Sandeng’s death broke, the UDP once again rallied, marching peacefully through the capital to demand answers. And once again, riot police rushed to the scene, arresting Ousainou Darboe, secretary-general of the UDP, and other senior members of the party. According to a UDP news release issued on the evening of April 16, over two dozen party members were reportedly detained and three people were killed, including Sandeng. Many of them have been charged with “unlawful assembly,” among other crimes, but the party has said it will organize more demonstrations in the coming days.
U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon, the African Union, and the U.S. State Department all condemned the Gambian government’s severe response to the peaceful protests, the latter urging the government to exercise “restraint” and “calm.” But if the UDP goes ahead with its plan for more protests, there is a risk that Jammeh’s paranoid government will respond with additional deadly force. In fact, the president has already threatened that “protesters will not be spared” and blamed Western countries for instigating the unrest.
It is for this reason that the United States should move beyond rhetoric and sanction Jammeh’s regime for its clear record of abuse. It should impose travel restrictions on individuals implicated in grave human rights abuses and freeze the U.S. assets of Jammeh, his immediate family, and members of his inner circle. Jammeh’s lavish $3.5 million mansion in Potomac, Maryland would certainly be a good place to start.
Part of the reason Jammeh’s government is so jittery is that it weathered a coup attempt less than two years ago. In December 2014, an unlikely band of diaspora members — including two U.S. Army veterans and a Minnesota businessman — staged an assault on the presidential palace while Jammeh was outside the country. The putsch failed and the regime responded with fury, sentencing eight alleged coup plotters to death and indiscriminately jailing scores of Gambians suspected of being associated with them, some as old as 84 and as young as 14.
The crackdown drew harsh rebukes from rights activists, but it was later revealed that the United States may have indirectly tipped off the Gambian government that a coup was in the works. According to the Washington Post, the FBI had been monitoring some of the plotters’ communications, and the State Department later informed another West African nation that one of them had left the United States in the hopes it would intercept him. Despite Jammeh’s egregious rights record, the U.S. government has largely refrained from speaking out against him over the years. (The Gambian leader was welcomed to the White House as recently as August 2014, when he attended the first-ever U.S.-Africa Leaders Summit.)
According to people present at this protest, a daylight demonstration in Serrekunda, Banjul, was peaceful with participants holding signs calling for electoral reforms. The protest was dispersed by police who arrested several people, including the following UDP members: Solo Sandeng, Fatoumata Jawara (Female Youth President), Fatou Camara, (Constituency Women’s Leader), Nokoi Njie (2nd Vice President of the Women’s Wing) and Lang Marong (Deputy Campaign Manager).They were taken to Mile 2 Prison and later to the National Intelligence Agency for interrogation.
But in truth, the tide had begun to turn against Jammeh months before the attempted coup, when he signed a harsh anti-gay law as part of an overhaul of the country’s penal code. The European Union responded by suspending $186 million in aid while the United States made Gambia ineligible for the African Growth and Opportunity Act, a trade preference program that provides duty-free treatment to U.S. imports from sub-Saharan Africa, making it the only nation besides Swaziland and South Sudan to lose eligibility because of its dismal human rights record.International isolation has made Jammeh only more vulnerable at home. Before last week’s protests, Gambia’s notoriously fractious political opposition had begun to piece together a unified front, with top decision makers from different political parties putting forward a common agenda: namely, unseating Jammeh at the polls in December.
But even if the opposition works together, it will be fighting an uphill battle against Jammeh’s ruthless political machine. So blatant was the government’s intimidation of the opposition during the last election in 2011 that the Economic Community of West African States refused to send observers — an unprecedented move for the regional bloc. That is why it’s crucial that international donors, namely the United States, both invest in Gambia’s newly unified pro-democracy movement and signal to Jammeh that his government’s brutal and ongoing crimes will no longer be tolerated.
Nigeria’s herdsmen and farmers are locked in a deadly, underreported conflict
A Fulani herdsmen waters his cattle on a plain between Malkohi and Yola in Nigeria, May 7, 2015. Clashes between herdsmen and settled communities are claiming hundreds of lives annually in Nigeria.
The jihadi group Boko Haram are usually characterized as the biggest threat to Nigeria’s state security and even as one of the world’s deadliest militant groups.
But in the first four months of 2016, Boko Haram have actually been responsible for less deaths—208 to be precise—than other sectarian groups in Nigeria combined, which have accounted for 438 deaths so far, according to the Council on Foreign Relations’ Nigeria Security Tracker. A huge chunk of these are down to an ongoing conflict between predominantly Fulani herdsmen and settled farming communities, which is costing the Nigerian economy billions of dollars per year as well as hundreds—if not thousands—of lives.
The Fulani —also known as the Fula or Peul—constitute a mostly Muslim people scattered throughout West Africa but concentrated in certain places, such as northern Nigeria. Fulanis are primarily nomadic cattle herders who follow their livestock along migratory patterns. This wandering lifestyle has brought them into conflict with settled farming communities in Nigeria, who have accused the Fulani of cattle rustling, kidnapping and murder.
Clashes between mostly Fulani herdsmen and settled communities have been concentrated in north central Nigeria, particularly the states of Benue, Plateau, Kaduna and Nassarawa. Nigerian President Muhammadu Buhari ordered an inquiry into clashes between herdsmen and farmers in Benue at the end of February, which reportedly resulted in hundreds of deaths and thousands being displaced. As well as the obvious security threat, the low-level battles are draining Nigeria’s economy of resources and potential funds. A series of reports published in July 2015 by global humanitarian agency Mercy Corps found that the four problem states stood to gain up to $13.7 billion annually in total macroeconomic benefits if the conflict between herdsmen and farmers was reduced to near-zero. And the benefits are not just limited to state-level—Nigerian households affected by the ongoing clashes could expect their incomes to increase by between 64 and 210 percent were the conflicts to be resolved.
Nigeria’s Middle Belt—where the four problem states are located—is an area of ethnic and religious diversity, where the majority Muslim north meets the largely Christian south. On top of this, the Fulani have historical rivalries with other ethnic groups in Nigeria, particularly the Hausa. Led by the religious reformer Usman dan Fodio, a Fulani army fought a four-year jihad in the predominantly Hausa states of what is now northern Nigeria, eventually triumphing and establishing the Sokoto caliphate. The caliphate was one of the most prominent African empires in the 19th century and was only abolished by the British in 1903.
Because of this fraught geography and history, the herdsmen-farmer conflict is often characterized as ethnic or religious in nature. But this is a mischaracterization, according to Lisa Inks, one of the authors of the Mercy Corps reports. “We definitely believe that the conflicts are caused primarily by competition for scarce resources,” says Inks, citing land and water as the two major conflict drivers. According to Inks, solutions lie in supporting both parties by the establishment of grazing reserves for livestock, increasing funding for communities affected by the clashes and improving security at conflict hotspots.
The security implications of marauding, armed Fulani herdsmen are significant for Nigeria, already struggling to contain the Boko Haram insurgency in the northeast , revived militant attacks on oil facilities in the Niger Delta and substantial pro-Biafran protests in the southeast. If taken together, casualties attributed to Fulani herdsmen in 2014 totaled 1,229, according to the Institute for Economics & Peace Global Terrorism Index 2015. It is problematic, however, to group Fulani herdsmen together into a single unit and classify them as a terrorist movement, according to Leena Koni Hoffman, Nigeria expert and associate fellow at Chatham House. Fulani herdsmen cannot be considered a terrorist group akin to Boko Haram or the Islamic State militant group (ISIS), says Hoffman, because of “the absence of a core ideology around the violence.”
Despite the lack of an ideological basis, links between the organized militants of Boko Haram and the roaming Fulani herdsmen have been suggested before. According to Hoffman, collaboration between herdsmen and Boko Haram is unlikely in terms of formal affiliation but could take place in different types of “criminal activity,” such as cattle rustling. “There could be a link between groups who are exploiting the context of insecurity and instability [in Nigeria] to strengthen their position,” says Hoffman.
Whether such links exist or not, the herdsmen-farmers conflict is clearly damaging Buhari’s vision of a unified Nigeria and sucking potential resources and revenues out of the country. “The farmer-herdsmen conflict is not even the most high-profile conflict in Nigeria,” says Inks, “[But] even this ongoing, relatively low-level intercommunal conflict is costing the country billions.”
The brutal toll of Boko Haram’s attacks on civilians
ATTACKS ON CIVILIANS SINCE 2011 Circles are sized based on number of fatalitie
As the Islamic State’s attacks in Europe have captured the world’s attention, an ISIS-affiliated group has been waging an even deadlier campaign in Africa.
Hundreds killed when 20 attackers detonated coordinated blasts at police stations around a city. Fifty dead when suicide bombers, including women and children, attacked a market and camps housing people trying to escape the violence. Fifty Christians targeted and killed in a student housing area near a school.
People gather around burnt cars near a Catholic church after a bomb blast in Nigeria’s capital, Abuja, on December 25, 2011. (Sunday Aghaeze/Getty Images)Young girls fleeing Boko Haram walk past livestock burned by the militants on Feb. 6 in Mairi village, near Maiduguri. (AFP/Getty Images)
These are a few of the hundreds of horrors wrought regularly by Boko Haram, an Islamist militant organization based in Nigeria, over the past six years.
The group’s rise, some experts say, is attributable to government corruption and economic differences between the Muslim northern areas and more populous and prosperous Christian South.
While military forces have had some success regaining territory in the past year, Boko Haram continues to carry out attacks on civilians.
Last year was the group’s deadliest yet, according to the Armed Conflict Location and Event Data Project, which tracks civil unrest and political violence in Africa and Asia.
Researchers recorded more than 6,000 fatalities resulting from Boko Haram attacks aimed at civilians. Because the counts below include only attacks on civilians, and not battles over territory, they underestimate what some say is a total of 15,000 people killed by the group.
Deaths in attacks aimed at civilians, by month
Jan. 2015: A multi-day attack in the town of Baga left about 2,000 dead, some estimates suggest.
Conflict in Nigeria, Africa’s most populous country, has spilled over into neighboring nations, including Cameroon, which recently launched a campaign to retake territory from the militants. Chad, Benin and Niger have also contributed soldiers to the fight.
How Boko Haram evolved
A government crackdown in 2009 led the group to turn to violence. In 2010, a jailbreak freed more than 700 inmates. Increasingly in the following years, militants carried out hundreds of attacks, many that killed more than 10, and some that claimed hundreds.
2011
114 dead in 32 attacks
Boko Haram was established in 2002 in Maiduguri, but it was years before it spawned an insurgency. By 2011, its fighters were attacking government officials, police and religious figures. That December, it launched a
suicide attack on a U.N. regional headquarters in Abuja.
2012
910 dead in 148 attacks
The insurgents increased the sophistication of their attacks, with a gunfire-and-bomb assault on government buildings that killed at least 185 people in January in the Northern city of Kano.
2013
1,008 dead in 108 attacks
As Boko Haram’s attacks grew more brutal, President Goodluck Jonathan declared a state of emergency in three states in the northeast. The U.S. government
designated Boko Haram a terrorist organization.
2014
3,425 dead in 220 attacks
The group gained international attention after its fighters kidnapped more than 200 schoolgirls, which prompted the global #BringBackOurGirls campaign. That August, Boko Haram announced it had established a “caliphate” in the expanding territory it controlled.
2015
6,006 dead in 270 attacks
Boko Haram declared its loyalty to the Islamic State. Troops from Nigeria, Cameroon, Chad and Niger launched an offensive that eventually recaptured many towns from the militants.
2016
422 dead in 36 attacks
Boko Haram has been forced from much of the territory it controlled, but it continues to carry out suicide
bombings in populated areas in northeastern Nigeria.
An aerial view of the destroyed town of Gwoza, Boko Haram’s base in northern Nigeria, recently retaken by the Nigerians, on April 8, 2015. (Jane Hahn for the Washington Post)
As government forces have reclaimed territory, the group’s scorched-earth tactics have been on display.
“The scene was post-apocalyptic, an entire city destroyed. Almost every building, it seemed, had been ransacked or set on fire,” Washington Post reporter Kevin Sieff wrote last year after touring the group’s former capital city, Gwoza. “Schools were in ruin. Bodies decayed in a pile.”
Millions of Nigerians fleeing violence
A girl does laundry in the Dalori camp for internally displaced persons in Maiduguri, Nigeria, which houses close to 20,000 people. (Jane Hahn for the Washington Post)
Stopping the insurgency is not the only crisis Nigeria faces. More than 2 million Nigerians have been forced to leave their homes to escape the violence. The map below shows the number of internally displaced persons by country, as reported by the Internal Displacement Monitoring Center:
Recent estimate from the International Organization for Migration
While it may not draw the attention of the West as frequently as the Islamic State, Boko Haram is one of the most devastating terrorist organizations in the world. Regaining territory from the group will only be the first step in a long process of healing the deep wounds it has inflicted.
Saudi Defence Minister and Deputy Crown Prince, Mohammed bin Salman
A 30-year-old you may have never heard of is trying to build a company worth four Apples — and a Nike to spare.
Deputy Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, a fast riser in the Saudi hierarchy and member of the new generation, has the world’s ear after an expansive interview where he elaborated on his plan for taking the mega-giant state oil company public.
Bin Salman, son of King Salman, was the surprise choice to serve as deputy to Crown Prince Muhammad bin Nayef, the 56-year-old who had been seen as a possible heir apparent but is now viewed by some as more of a rival. Bin Nayef is interior minister who rose to power on his success as head of the Saudi counterterrorism program. King Salman, himself 80, took the throne when King Abdullah died in January 2015.
He stands in stark contrast to the traditional Western image of a Saudi leader — young, urbane and with views that seem far from traditional.
He is chairman of the Supreme Petroleum Council, above Oil Minister Ali al-Naimi, and he also is head of the military, and a driving force behind the war in Yemen.
“Bin Salman’s clearly trying to assert himself, and relying upon the broad degree of authority has father has assigned him,” said one U.S. official. Bin Nayef, on the other hand is seen as the more steady and tested hand, the official said.
Bin Salman has also been popular with Saudi youth, who have been supporting him through the Yemen war. About 70 percent of the population of Saudi Arabia is under 30, and 40 percent is unemployed, said Helima Croft, head of commodity strategy at RBC Capital Markets.
“That’s his constituency. … If your policy is to consolidate a significant portion of the population behind you, he’s done that. I think he’s played the ‘Game of Thrones’ in Saudi Arabia particularly well,” said Croft. “He consolidated power faster than anyone imagined. He’s talked about doing things that go to the heart of the Saudi social contract. He doesn’t seem to be afraid. How this story ends I have no idea. All I know is we’re in totally unchartered water.”
President Obama in May, 2015 in Washington with Crown Prince Mohammed bin Nayef, center, and Deputy Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, whose father, King Salman bin Abdulaziz, passed over older princes to put him second in line to the Saudi throne.
Bin Salman helped knock 4 percent off the price of crude Friday, after he threw into doubt the ability of world oil producers to agree to an output freeze at their meeting in Qatar on April 17. The prince was reported as saying the kingdom would not participate in a freeze if Iran and other major producers, both OPEC and non-OPEC, do not join the program.
“This is dead in the water then,” Croft said. “No one is going to overrule bin Salman on oil policy. If he’s going to stick to his position, there’s no point in showing up in Doha.”
The idea of a global production freeze has been supported by Russia and Saudi Arabia, through Oil Minister Ali al-Naimi. But Iran has said it has no intention of freezing output as it works to return oil to the world market, now that sanctions against it have been lifted.
“If he says it and that’s not aligned with what Naimi and other officials are saying, then those other officials are going to come into line. They have to adhere to what the leadership says. If that’s the new negotiating line that makes meeting a freeze agreement a lot more difficult than the conciliatory, and arguably, a little more constructive attitude the Saudis have had in the past,” said Michael Cohen, head of energy commodities research at Barclays. Cohen said without the freeze, and with more production from Iran, Libya, Iraq and elsewhere, it’s conceivable oil could revisit the lows from February, in the $20s per barrel.
Prince Mohammad with United States Secretary of State John Kerry, 7 May 2015
Daniel Yergin, vice chairman of IHS, said the fact there is a Doha meeting at all shows the strains being felt by producers. “The number of producers going there shows you how alarmed the governments are about their finances with low oil prices,” he said.
Yergin said the freeze was not a cut in production but was meant to serve as a stabilization of world oil prices. “The deputy crown prince underlines the fact that until it’s clear where Iran’s level of production is going to settle out, that it won’t go much farther than it has. The Saudis will be at the meeting, but as so many things involving oil these days, it goes back to the rivalry between Saudi Arabia and Iran, both in the region and in terms of market share,” he said.
Bin Salman, in a five-hour interview with Bloomberg, also discussed his vision for the kingdom’s Public Investment Fund (PIF) and the sale of a public stake in the Saudi oil giant Saudi Aramco. The proceeds of the stock offering, expected next year or later, would help fund PIF which ultimately could control $2 trillion and help diversify Saudi Arabia away from oil, according to the report.
“What I’m worried about on Saudi Arabia right now is the lack of coherence of policy. Maybe he’s going to become the central messenger and he’s going to come up with a grand vision, and everyone sticks with it. But when you look at the FX (foreign exchange) drawdown and the removal of funds from foreign asset managers it raises questions,” said Croft. “I think the oil story is very important. We had al Naimi out there saying it doesn’t matter if Iran doesn’t participate. It’s kind of lurching from message to message.”
Saudi Arabia has drawn down more than $150 billion in foreign reserves to meet its budget deficit as oil cratered. It has also been issuing debt and tapping bank loans. Saudi Arabia is a very low cost producer, estimated at under $10 a barrel but it needs 10 times that to meet its budget requirements.
Prince Mohammad with Russian President Vladimir Putin, 18 June 2015
“He’s the top decision maker on oil. … That’s part of his brief,” said Yergin. “I think these decisions are very considered. It’s not just made up on the spot. … One of the messages is that Saudi Arabia is going this to be a bigger force in the world economy, not just in terms of oil but in terms of finance … these messages have to be seen together. This is all part of a larger program of reform and protecting the Saudi position in terms of oil.”
In the interview, bin Salman explained that Saudi Arabia would sell shares of Aramco’s parent company and turn the oil giant into an industrial conglomerate. The kingdom currently plans to sell less than 5 percent of Aramco.
“IPOing Aramco and transferring its shares to PIF will technically make investments the source of Saudi government revenue, not oil,” said the prince. He said that after diversifying investments, Saudi Arabia, within 20 years, would become an economy that does not depend mainly on oil.
Buhari administration more corrupt than Goodluck Jonathan?
File photo, NNPC Towers, Abuja : Till date petroleum hawkers hoover around the corporate headquarters of the state-run Nigerian National Petroleum Corp. (NNPC) in Abuja, doing black business.
Nigeria’s state-run oil firm is withholding billions of dollars in revenue from the government’s coffers despite President Muhammadu Buhari’s war on corruption, according to a report published Thursday by the Natural Resource Governance Institute, a New York-based watchdog. Under Buhari’s administration, Nigerian National Petroleum Corp. failed to remit $4.2 billion — 66 percent of proceeds — to the treasury in the second half of last year, the report revealed.
The company, aka NNPC, raked in $6.3 billion from its crude oil sales in the second half of 2015, but only $2.1 billion entered the government’s account. While some of the company’s withholdings cover known costs, NNPC has not fully explained other expenses.
“This was 12 percent higher than the withholdings under Goodluck Jonathan in 2013 and 2014,” authors Aaron Sayne and Alexandra Gillies said in the report, obtained by International Business Times. “Corruption aside, allocating $4.2 billion in six months to NNPC expenses of unknown priority raises serious questions about fiscal responsibility.”
The report said it would be cheaper for the Nigerian government to finance its record $30 billion budget for the 2016 fiscal year by reining in NNPC spending rather than through outside borrowing. Nigeria expects to spend more than a third of its federal revenue servicing its debt this year, up from 26 percent last year, the country’s Debt Management Office said this month.
“The Finance Ministry has floated plans to fund this year
’s appropriations with a further $5 billion in loans from the World Bank and other lenders. These lenders, along with Nigerian stakeholders, should ask hard questions about the blank check enjoyed by NNPC before giving a green light to new debt,” the authors warned in the report.
Buhari, who was elected in March of last year on an anti-graft and anti-terrorism ticket, has vowed to clean up corruption within the state-owned oil firm. A report published last summer by the National Resource Governance Institute found the NNPC withheld about $12.3 billion from the sale of 110 million barrels of oil over 10 years during the administrations of Presidents Goodluck Jonathan and Umaru Musa Yar’Adua.
Since taking office in late May, Buhari has appointed himself as the petroleum minister, fired the entire board and executive directors of the NNPC and hired a Harvard-educated lawyer as the company’s managing director to lead reforms. But Thursday’s report suggests there’s still much work to be done.
“The leadership could build on gains made to date by clarifying the financial relationship between the NNPC and the state. Otherwise, oil sector corruption and waste could return to their prior devastating levels once the president leaves office or prices rise,” the authors said in the report.
Laraba Bitrus was working in a small grocer’s shop in the northeastern Nigerian town of Gwoza when Boko Haram militants invaded. With nowhere to run, the armed men took her captive, beat her with a whip, and forced her to watch as they sawed off her uncle’s head. After 11 days, she fled on foot, traveling through the bush to Madagali, where she stayed until the extremists took over that small town as well, forcing her to flee again: this time further south to Yola, the capital of Adamawa state, where she now lives in the catholic St. Theresa’s refugee camp.
She was one of the lucky ones.
More than six years into their bloody campaign in northern Nigeria and the surrounding Lake Chad region, Boko Haram extremists have killed around 20,000 people. Entire villages have been razed to the ground; men and boys executed or forcibly recruited to join the militants’ ranks; and women and girls taken against their will as wives and household slaves. As part of the group’s brutal effort to establish an Islamic caliphate ruled under a strict interpretation of sharia, its militants have conducted mass rape.
And though Yola is safer than the most besieged areas of the country farther north, it is not free from the fear imposed by the group, which pledged allegiance to the Islamic State in March 2015. Thousands of displaced people are still seeking shelter in the city of 350,000 residents. Despite some critical military successes on the part of the Nigerian government, and a regional taskforce supported by Chad, Niger, Cameroon, and Benin, which have caused the group to lose control of much of its territory (an area onceestimatedas the size of Belgium), Boko Haram continues to terrorize parts of Nigeria.
Women are especially vulnerable.
These photographs were taken in a safe location in Yola, away from the St. Theresa’s refugee camp on a hot day in January. There was a single room set aside, where these portraits — of some 40 women — could be taken in relative quiet from the morning through the afternoon. Apart from the bits of conversation and interview, the only noise was the audible click of the camera’s shutter. The only source of light came from the room’s one window.
As these women — the ones who chose to speak of their captivity — shared pieces of their stories, an air of defiance permeated the room. It varied from woman to woman in its intensity, but it never entirely disappeared.
Mary John Ibrahim, a Christian woman in her early 50s, was working in the government hospital in Gwoza when Boko Haram overran the area and burned down the hospital.
With many other residents, she fled in panic to the bush, only to be later captured by Boko Haram and brought back to Gwoza, where she was held for two weeks. During that time, she was forced to convert to Islam; when she refused, she was beaten severely and starved as punishment. One night, she was able to flee and hide in the mountains along the Cameroonian border, where, for one month, she was hidden and fed by local Muslims, who later on helped her cross the border to Cameroon.
During the takeover of Gwoza, 60-year-old Tani Bitrus was captured alongside 50 other women by Boko Haram. Her husband was executed by fighters.
During her monthlong captivity, she and the other women were compelled at gunpoint to learn Islamic teachings; when they confessed to being unable to read the Quran, the women were beaten. One day, while on the way to the market, Tani and three other women escaped, helped by Muslim women of the same Salidva tribe. Eventually, they escaped to Cameroon and, after that, to the St. Theresa’s camp in Yola.
But oftentimes, instead of returning to supportive communities, those women who manage to escape Boko Haram return to an unexpected stigma. According to a Februaryreportpublished by UNICEF and International Alert, these women are often referred to as “Boko Haram wives.” And for those who become pregnant after being raped in captivity, their children are thought tainted because they have “bad blood.”
Many of the women from Gwoza — like Laraba, Mary John, and Tani, who now live in the St. Theresa’s camp — are afraid to go home.
Andy Spyra is a freelance photographer currently based in Dortmund, Germany. Siobhán O’Grady, a staff writer atForeign Policy, contributed to this story.
WAELE/ARCELFA: Securing the dignity of African women
By Anthony Obi Ogbo | Houston, Texas
At a Presentation event held in Ondo State of Nigeria to benefit rural women with 60 sets of 8HP Milling Machine, Otunba Dr Basirat Nahibi (OON), founder and president of the Women Advancement for Economic and Leadership Empowerment in Africa (WAELE/ARCELFA) reinstated a mission to stand as a stronger voice toward meeting the aspirations of the African Women regarding economic empowerment and social freedom. This was in October, 2005.
In her words, Dr. Nahibi said, “We believe that by partnering with this administration, we can reduce if not eradicate poverty totally in our dear country. You can always count on our support whenever you need us while we expect same from you to sustain the growth of this young organization.” This basically explains the core objectives of WAELE/ARCELFA as an entity, and it social responsibility to the women gender.
In her words, Dr. Nahibi said, “We believe that by partnering with this administration, we can reduce if not eradicate poverty totally in our dear country. You can always count on our support whenever you need us while we expect same from you to sustain the growth of this young organization.”
WAELE/ARCELFA was founded on May 8 2004 to meet the sociopolitical needs of women in African and inspire them to participate in the economic decision-making; peace and conflict resolution; and affairs of governance in the continent. Today the group has spread through 42 African Countries, assisting African rural women to organizing themselves for improved livelihoods through targeted events and programs.
Globally, issues about women is swiftly gaining unprecedented attention. Mid December 2015, the United Nations (UN) Women introduced new policy brief series to pave the way for gender equality and women’s rights. Briefs focus on national social protection; gender equality; child development and job creation; protecting women’s income security in old age; and possibilities of macroeconomic policy for gender equality.
On another significant note, according to the UN Women, African continent has demonstrated a commitment to promote gender equality and the empowerment of women. For instance, almost all countries have ratified the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women; more than half have ratified the African Union’s Protocol on the Rights of Women in Africa. These values accord with the mission of the Women Advancement for Economic and leadership Empowerment (WAELE/ARCELFA) in unifying various women groups and providing a stronger voice toward meeting the needs and prospects of the African Women.
International Guardian sat one-one-one with Dr. Nahibi and discussed her leadership of an entity that has made several impacts in the state of the African women. She is a known figure in the Nigeria’s political arena, who in 1978 joined the then People’s Redemption Party (PRP) in the country’s quest for a second republic. She was a member of the Social Democratic Party (SDP) and also a founding member of both the All Progressives Party (APP) and Congress for Progressive Change (CPC). Her partisan involvement in the current Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) and All Progressive Congress (APC) substantiates her status as a godmother in the country’s political confraternity.Yet, Dr. Nahibi mentioned nothing about politics, but consistently stressed the urgent need to address regional issues about gender inequality, hunger, and uncertainties that permeate various region in the continent. She is currently a member of the African Union (AU) Committee of 30 for African Women Fund, and spoke heavily about WAELE/ARCELFA’s effort to attain peace and stability; and recognition and acceptance of women in the leadership process in the continent. “It has been a long journey, I tell you. I recall on the 11th September 2006 when WAELE/ARCELFA visited His Excellency Mr. Jakaya Mrisho Kikwete, President of the United Republic of Tanzania in Dar-Es-Salaam to commend him on the appointment of 16 female Ministers and other women in top decision making positions – we sat down with him and discussed the problems affecting African women and the way forward. The meeting was successful,” she said.
In furtherance of their mission to advocate a peaceful region, WAELE/ARCELFA collaborated with the Sudanese General Women Union (SGWU) to hold a peace meeting in Khartoum on Darfur issues in October 2008. The group visited President Omer Al-Basher to discuss the Darfur issue as well as issues concerning Sudan and the Republic of Chad. As a result of this meeting, the Sudanese border with Chad and Sudanese Embassy in Ndjamena were re-opened. “Special credit was given to WAELE/ARCELFA peace mission to Khartoum when this border was re – opened by the Sudanese Government, and these are just a few out of the numerous regional engagement we have facilitated to attain a peaceful region,” Dr. Nahibi said.
Dr. Nahibi continued on Sudan, “My group visited the Internally Displaced Person’s camp (IDP) in Al – Fashir, Northern Darfur in May 2009 and organized peace meeting with the Dafurian women in collaboration with Sudanese General Women Union (SGWU). More than 3,000 women participated in the peace meeting. Also we visited South Sudan in October 2010, met with the First Lady H.E. Mrs. Kiir and discussed the need for peace in both North & South Sudan after a prevalent referendum. That was not all – WAELE/ARCELFA also visited South Sudan in Feb 2014 on a peace mission and delivered relief materials to the IDP.”
Other rewarding peace missions by WAELE/ARCELFA include; a visited to the women of Tindouf, Algeria in Dec 2010; a special mission to Saharawi refugee camp in December, 2010, and another visit to Juba, South Sudan from in February 2014 for a PEACE operation.
In accordance with its mission, how has WAELE/ARCELFA lived up to its expectation in unifying various women groups and providing a stronger voice towards meeting the aspirations African Women? Dr. Nahibi said that her organization has conducted a number of conferences and seminars to enhance gender sensitivity of various governments in Africa and to empower women to assert their God-given rights to aspire to positions of leadership in government, private sector, and the civil society.
She said, “We held our first continental conference in Bamako, Mali, in March 2004, and 14 African countries participated. The second WAELE/ARCELFA continental conference themed “African women in a contemporary world: issues on political and economic development” was held at the ECOWAS Secretariat, Abuja in July 2005. During this event, representatives from 18 African countries attended. If I may recall, Hon. Mrs. Gertrude Mongella, former President of Pan African Parliament led the Tanzanian delegation and delivered the keynote address. Also, in October 2006, our continental conference took place in Abuja, Nigerian at the International Conference Centre. Senator Joy Emodi gave the keynote address,” themed, “Politics and nation building: the role of Nigerian women.”
WAELE/ARCELFA has been consistent with using its conferences to organize women at continental levels to address their communal needs. In the 2010 continental conference held in Abuja, for instance, 35 African countries participated. Among special guests were General Yakubu Gowon, a former Nigeria Head of State, Hon. Joyce Banda, Vice President of Malawi, and Hon. Joice Mujuru, Vice President of Zimbabwe. In September 2011, WAELE/ARCELFA’s 4th continental conference, 45 countries participated while Amb Frank Ruddy of United State delivered the Keynote address.
Women and Gender Cluster: Kenya Nairobi 17th -18th Oct, 2015. At the moment, WAELE/ARCELFA’s economic empowerment has visibly empowered thousands of women in sub-Saharan African regions.
In addition to the conferences, the organization’s humanitarian projects across various regions have been successful in providing underprivileged women with basic necessities. For instance, during the ethnic religious crises between the Christians and Muslims in Plateau State of Nigeria, WAELE/ARCELFA donated tons household items; including blankets, mats, buckets, bowls, and foodstuffs to the victims. In 2008, the group visited the Chadian refugees during civil strife and handed out to hundreds of victims; bags of rice, maize, and millet, and salt, cartons of spaghetti, detergents, and plastic cups. Other relief items included; 5,000 slippers, 5,000 buckets, 2,000 mats, 2,000 blankets & and 200 boxes of milk. In 2014, the group also visited Juba, South Sudan where hundreds of underprivileged victims of the system were presented with similar relief materials.
The progress made so far by WAELE/ARCELFA in the sub-Saharan African regions on women affairs has been enormous. Dr. Nahibi admitted that the current situation regarding gender equality and the empowerment of women in Africa needed more work, but touted her group’s unwavering mission in bridging the equality gap and reducing economic inadequacies. “We have tried in many areas on gender equality and empowerments though advocacy and conferences. However, we still have a lot of work to do regarding the 35% affirmative action which is still unachievable in many of the countries including Nigeria. This year, we are also focusing on gender violence and women rights,” she noted.
At the moment, WAELE/ARCELFA’s economic empowerment has visibly empowered thousands of women in sub-Saharan African regions. In Nigeria alone, noted Dr. Nahibi, “More than 10,000 women in Akwa Ibom, Borno, Ondo & Abia States of have been successfully rewarded with economic empowerment equipment to boost productions in their individual trades and disciplines. Indeed, those that are into cassava processing could only produce two bags of cassava manually with hard labor in a week, but after giving them the equipment, they can now produce more than 20 bags daily. Similarly, the women that are into palm oil processing could only produce 20 liters in a week. It is my pleasure to bring to your knowledge that with the assistance of WAELE/ARCELFA, they can now produce 400 liters in a day.”
Dr. Nahibi is also involved with the African Union’s Economic, Social and Cultural Council (ECOSOCC), coordinating the West Africa headquarter of the Women and Gender Cluster. She is also a member of African Union (AU) Steering Committee for the Fund for African Women. African union ECOSSOC promotes dialogue between all segments of Africa people on issues concerning the continent and its future. The committee also creates strong partnership avenues between governments and all segments of civil societies, especially; women, the youth, children and the Diaspora, organized labor, private sectors, and professional groups
According to Dr. Nahibi, “as a team, we have been able to propagate the participation of Africa civil societies in the implementation of the policies and the program of the African Union – the most crucial aspect being the support of policies and programs that promote peace, securities, and stabilities; and foster continental developments & integration.”
“It is my hope that international organizations and other humanitarian entities in Africa and around the globe collaborate with us and support us as we promote and defend not just the culture of gender equality but also the culture of good governance, and democratic principles, human rights, and social justice. I would also call on the media – both local and international to support our effort in promoting and strengthening the institutional, human and operational capacities of the African civil society,” Dr. Nahibi concluded.
