Time to build a new, unified nation called Uganda

by James Wasula in the Daily Monitor

Why is “tribalism” rife in Uganda? Answers may be as many as those willing to answer! However, the crucial fact is that Uganda is only a geographical expression. Sadly, none of the governments we have had has genuinely tackled this challenge. Ugandans demand transformation of Uganda into a nation that all of us shall be proud of.

But what is a nation? Ernest Renan (1823-1892), a French theorist stated: “A nation is a soul, a spiritual principle.” I cannot agree more. A nation is a large body of people, associated with a particular territory, that is sufficiently conscious of its unity to seek or to possess a government peculiarly its own. The history of Eastern Africa’s Great Lakes Region, from AD 1500 reveals that a nation called Bunyoro-Kitara existed and stretched to as far as Rwanda. It had a particular territory and a large body of people sufficiently conscious of its unity who were content with a government peculiar to it.

Unfortunately, in July 1890 when the entire region north of Lake Victoria was given to Great Britain, the individual nations were merely bundled into Uganda. Since then, balkanisation has been the order of the day with no effort made to transform Uganda into a nation. Consequently, nationalities remain loyal to their nations as evidenced by the Banyoro expelling Bafuruki from their nation. A few weeks after, Buganda rioted due to the prohibition of their king from visiting one of his territories (Bugerere, Kayunga District).

What we need today is to understand how the nations that form Uganda want to be governed; not how we want to govern them. Legislations may be passed to regulate society but such legislations will never solve political questions.

A serious review of the Constitution is needed if we are to attain nationalism because some of the provisions of the 1995 Constitution are inconsistent with the aspirations and spirit of the people of Uganda as expressed in the preamble of the Constitution and the Odoki and Sempebwa reports (constitutional principles). If this Constitution were to be put before the Constitutional Court and tested against the constitutional principles and international laws, most likely the verdict would be in the negative.

Therefore in the run-up to 2011 elections, political organisations must start inquiring from the electorate how we want to forge a new unified and democratic nation called Uganda – bearing in mind that Uganda is conglomeration of many nations that already meet the description of a nation.

Nigerians in Diaspora Remitted U.S. $7 Billion to Nigeria 2008

Nigerians in Diaspora Remitted U.S. $7 Billion to Nigeria 2008:

Bank of Industry revealed that remittances from about 20 million Nigerians in Diaspora accounted for more than $7 billion of Africa ’s $14 billion in 2008.
The amount, which represented more than 50 percent of the whole of remittances in Africa , was based on BoI’s research findings. The Bank said it was also revealed that [...]

Why did One Laptop Per Child fail?

from FP Passport by Joshua Keating

Over at UN Dispatch, Alanna Shaikh has a thought-provoking eulogy for Nicholas Negroponte's fizzling One-Laptop-Per-Child program:

Americans wanted the OLPC. We fell in love with
its tremendous promise and adorable shape. (note: I own an OLPC) We
were the first market it conquered. OLPC launched a give one-get one
promotion that let individuals pay $400 to donate one laptop and
receive one for themselves. It was a huge success, except that OLPC
wasn’t set up for that kind of customer order fulfillment. Laptops arrived far later than promised, and several thousand orders were simply lost.

Once the laptop finally started arriving in the
developing world, its impact was minimal. We think. No one is doing
much research on their impact on education; discussions are largely theoretical.
This we do know: OLPC didn’t provide tech support for the machines, or
training in how to incorporate them into education. Teachers didn’t
understand how to use the laptops in their lessons; some resented them.
Kids like the laptops, but they don’t actually seem to help them learn.

It’s time to call a spade a spade. OLPC was a failure. ...

As Shaikh suggests, OLPC is a classic case of a development program more tailored to the tastes and interests of its funders, than the needs of the people it was supposed to help. Back to the drawing board.

Mapping for disasters with UNOSAT

Mapping for disasters with UNOSAT
Seasonal floods are currently affecting West Africa. Senegal, Niger, Burkina Faso, Benin, Ghana, Sierra Leone, Mali, Liberia and Guinea are all experiencing significant damage to infrastructure and agriculture due to heavy rainfall causing floods in numerous locations. More than 350,000 people have been impacted thus far.

Based on requests from the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs, theSpace Charter - created to acquire imagery in the wake of disasters - was activated, and UNITAR/UNOSAT started satellite mapping. UNITAR/UNOSAT is formally recognized by the Space Charter as “Charter User Intermediary” -- this status grants the privilege “to act as gateway for request submissions on behalf of UN users related with humanitarian actions”. Imagery from Space Charter members was sent to UNOSAT within a few hours after being taken. A dedicated technical team immediately started the analysis, and turned this near real-time satellite imagery into useful information products, which were disseminated to a range of users in the field, at national & regional offices, and in headquarters. This rapid mapping production chain ensures all relevant parties simultaneously receive the same crucial information as quickly as possible.

One important component in this process was the use of the Google Map Maker data to clearly map the transport networks, allowing emergency managers to plan and implement relief assistance. For example, they could avoid roads that are marked on the maps as likely to be flooded by comparing satellite flood layers with road layers.

Satellite image derived flood map showing current situation in Niger - flooded areas in red.

Courtesy: UNITAR/UNOSAT & International Charter Space and Major Disasters

We've been pleased to hear positive feedback directly about this combination of the UNITAR/UNOSAT imagery with Map Maker data directly from those in the field -- as one simply stated, 'Thumbs up!'

Posted by Einar Bjorgo, Head, Rapid Mapping, Applications and User Relations, UNITAR/UNOSAT; France Lamy, Program Manager, Google.org

Mapping availability of HIV, AIDs and TB Services in Kenya

Mapping availability of HIV, AIDs and TB Services in Kenya

Ushahidi is delighted to announce a collaboration with AIDSPortal in the UK, and KANCO – Kenya AIDS NGO Consortium in Kenya to map the availability of HIV, AIDS, and TB services in Kenya. This collaboration is supported by Google.org, the philanthropic arm of Google. The Geo-Challenge grant awarded will make this endeavor possible. We are looking forward to making this mapping a tool that will be useful to KANCO and NGOs working in the Kenyan health space.

KANCO and AIDSportal were one of the first testers of the Alpha version of the Ushahidi platform, and we are grateful for their continued support of Ushahidi. Feedback received has been instrumental to the ‘Goma’ release and we look forward to working together on this important project.

More about Aidsportal

More about KANCO

More about Google.org

The test site is http://kanco.ushahidi.com/, we will update you once the site is customized fully and becomes operational.

"

Sudan: Oil Production Figures Underpinning Peace Agreement Don't Add Up, Warns Global Witness

allAfrica.com: Sudan
Global Witness (London)
7 September 2009
press release

The 2005 peace agreement, which brought to an end to the conflict between north and south Sudan, one of Africa's longest-running and most bloody wars, was based on an agreement to share oil revenues. However, new evidence uncovered by Global Witness raises serious questions about whether the revenues are being shared fairly.

"If the oil figures published by the Khartoum government aren't right, the division of the money from that oil between north and south Sudan won't be right," said Global Witness campaigner Rosie Sharpe.

The Global Witness report, Fuelling Mistrust: the need for transparency in Sudan's oil industry, is the first public analysis of Sudan's oil figures. It documents how the oil figures published by the Government of National Unity in Khartoum are smaller than the equivalent figures published by the China National Petroleum Corporation (CNPC), the operator of the oil blocks. While the respective figures for the only block located entirely in the north, and therefore not subject to revenue sharing, approximately match, those for blocks which are subject to revenue sharing do not. There were discrepancies of:

• 9% for the Greater Nile Petroleum Operating Company's blocks in 2007

• 14% for the Petrodar Operating Company's blocks in 2007

• 26% for the Greater Nile Petroleum Operating Company and Petro Energy's blocks in 2005

These findings cover six of the seven productive oil blocks in Sudan. A comparison of government and company figures was not possible for the White Nile Petroleum Operating Company's block as no company figures were available.

Mismatches of this magnitude represent potentially massive sums of money. If it were found that the oil figures published by the Government of National Unity had been under-reported by, for example, 10%, the southern government would be owed more than $600 million (on the basis that the Government of Southern Sudan has received more than $6 billion in oil revenues since the signing of the peace agreement). This is more than three times the south's combined annual budgets for health and education.

"Our findings do not necessarily mean that Khartoum has cheated the south out of money, but they do highlight the need for transparency. Unless the Government of Southern Sudan and Sudanese citizens can verify that the revenue sharing is fair, mistrust will grow and the peace agreement could be jeopardised," said Sharpe.

The Khartoum government publishes figures on its earnings from the oil industry but neither the Government of Southern Sudan nor Sudanese civil society have any way of verifying them. Khartoum is wholly responsible for marketing and exporting the south's oil: it compiles the figures on how much oil is produced and the price for which it sold. The southern government is not involved, despite the fact that oil revenues make up 98% of their income.

"The oil production and sales figures upon which the revenue sharing depend should be verified by independent third party audit and by legislation passed by Sudanese lawmakers that requires oil companies to disclose their payments," said Sharpe. "The peace agreement's international guarantors, including the UK, US and Norway, need to do more to promote transparency. China and Japan, who are the main customers for Sudanese oil, should also push for greater transparency, which will help ensure stability and a reliable supply.

http://www.globalwitness.org/media_library_get.php/1027/en/v12_final_sudan_fuelling_mistrust_lowres.pdf

Jatropha World Series - PANGEA

Jatropha World Series
Partners for Euro-African Green Energy (PANGEA) is an international biofuels trade association based in Brussels, Belgium that acts as a platform to support the creation of sustainable bioenergy industries in Africa. PANGEA lobbies governments, provides a network for the industry, and shares knowledge on best practices in both the EU and Africa. Its members produce, blend, trade, research and support the development of bioenergy in Africa and beyond.

In terms of lobbying, PANGEA works closely with the African-Caribbean-Pacific (ACP) Group of States as well as regional and national governments in Africa to develop their bioenergy strategies and policies internally, as well as advises them on relations with the EU. In the EU, PANGEA is consulted on similar matters, most recently concerning the Renewable Energy Directive and Sustainability Criteria consultations with the European Commission’s Directorate General of Energy and Transport (DG TREN).

PANGEA’s knowledge and capacity is based on its experience in EU & ACP policy building and both its members’ and network’s experience in business development and management. To make the information as useful as possible, PANGEA is currently building the largest database of biofuels projects and potentials in Africa.

Casamance - Hundreds displaced after clashes

IRIN Africa

ZIGUINCHOR, 4 September 2009 (IRIN) - At least 600 people have fled their homes on the outskirts of Ziguinchor, the main city of Senegal’s Casamance region, after clashes between the Senegalese army and separatist rebels.

On 4 September families were seen streaming out of the Diabir neighbourhood – which is just outside of Ziguinchor proper – toting mattresses, televisions, clothing, suitcases and other belongings on their heads, on bicycles or on donkey-carts. People also fled their homes in nearby Baraf.

Many families walked toward areas of Ziguinchor; they told IRIN they were going to join relatives who live in the city. But as of late afternoon at least 150 people were sitting on luggage or on the ground in an area on the edge of Ziguinchor called Grand Yoff.

“We have nowhere to go,” said one man, standing next to his wife and four young sons.

“Rebels came into Diabir,” he said. “Initially we all hid under beds and did not move. Then eventually we decided to leave because we were afraid something worse was to come.”

Heavy weapon fire could be heard in the centre of Ziguinchor throughout the morning of 4 September. The mortar fire followed an attack by rebels of the separatist Movement for the Democratic Forces of Casamance on an army base.

Into the night on 4 September humanitarian organizations and local authorities were evaluating the situation and determining people’s immediate needs.

“It is yet not clear exactly how many people fled their homes,” said Christina de Bruin, head of UN Children’s Fund (UNICEF) in Ziguinchor and UN area security coordinator. “A rapid estimation is that at least 600 people – 85 households – have left the areas of Diabir and Baraf.”

She added: “For UNICEF protection is the first concern. We need to find out first whether people are safe and whether any children are separated from their families.”

UNICEF’s de Bruin told IRIN the situation appears to have reached a new level of gravity. “For a long time the situation in Casamance has been described as ‘neither war, nor peace’. But things have degraded significantly in the last month and these latest events, sadly, have a direct impact on the population.”

The governor of Ziguinchor on 4 September called an emergency meeting with UN agencies and their partner organizations.

The UN has temporarily suspended movement of staff outside of Ziguinchor.

The incident marks the third time since 21 August rebels have clashed with the army.

Casamance is the site of one of Africa’s longest-running conflicts, sparked when MFDC separatists launched a rebellion in 1982. The region – where agriculture is the main source of local income – is hit by sporadic violence as a definitive settlement has yet to be achieved, five years after the government and rebels signed a peace agreement.

Vast parts of the lush region are not cultivated because of land mines and the recent fighting has many people afraid to return to their fields and so they risk losing what they recently planted.

Sudan's neighbors push for unification of North/South

FP Passport - Elizabeth Dickinson

Another piece of news from today's roundtable with Sudan envoy Scott Gration comes more subtlely, but perhaps just as importantly for anyone watching Sudan. "The neighbors" are pushing for unification when a vote comes in 2011. In other words, they are not keen on an independent Southern Sudan.

Gration says: "In many ways, the neighbors are all pushing for unity because they understand that the instability caused by a fledgling nation that is not ready for independence will have ramifications that spread far and wide across Africa. So countries like Ethiopia and Egypt and others are fearing, to some degree, an independence [vote]."

To recap: the 2005 peace agreement signed between North and South Sudan, ending a decades long war, stipulated that in 2011, the autonomous South would hold a referendum in which it would be allowed to decide whether it would prefer independence or unification. If the vote were to happen today, it's almost certain they would vote to become Africa's newest state.

If only it were that easy. In recent months, tensions have picked up along the border. The South blames the North for stirring up trouble and arming militias. The North blames the South for the same. More importantly, there has yet to be a settlement on the referendum law that will govern the 2011 vote. So it's far from clear that Khartoum is ready to let its Southern half... go.

If the neighbors are reluctant, matters are even more complicated. (Imagine moving into a 7 person townhouse with 6 hostile roommates... multiplied by South Sudan's between 7.9 and 9.5 million people.... and you've got the idea). Reticient neighbors would, uh, complicate the process that Gration already described as seriously daunting: "We're trying to bring about an environment [such] that, in five months, we can help make a country -- a country that will have its own currency, if they choose independence, have embassies around the world, have a central bank, control it's own airspace... there's a lot of work."

Gration promised to push ahead with the referendum law, acknowledging the overwhelming popular support for independence.

Unrelated, one more piece of news from the briefing: queried about the statement by the outgoing peacekeeping chief that the war in Darfur is essentially over, Gration replied that the he agreed, but said the tasks ahead in Darfur were no less daunting: "Even though the war, where the technical answer in terms of military view is that the war is over, the insecurity and the fear associated -- fearing for your life -- is still there."

"

Sierra Leone: Border Dispute - Time for Ecowas to Intervene

allAfrica.com
Lansana Gberie
3 September 2009

Once again, the source of an African conflict can be traced back to unsustainable demarcations of territories arbitrarily drawn by colonial powers and the resulting civil war, argues Lansana Gberie in this week's Pambazuka News.

Drawing on interviews as well as personal experience of the Guinea-Sierra Leone border dispute, Gberie focuses on issues such as how the discovery of diamonds escalated the border conflict and proposes a set of steps needed - mainly through the involvement of ECOWAS (Economic Community Of West African States) - to see the dispute brought to an end.

A necessary and mutually applauded security measure taken by Guinean forces during Sierra Leone's brutal rebel war has escalated into a border dispute which threatens the stability of both states. But while the issue - the Yenga dispute - is often cast in romantic and highly inflammatory terms by Sierra Leonean poets, so-called civil society activists and journalists, the entire story is steeped in bathos. Before the war, Yenga was a tiny impoverished fishing village of fewer than 100 people and 10 old shacks. But it is strategically placed among a system (albeit largely undeveloped) of inter-connected waterways tied to the large Moa river and formed by the convergence of three other rivers emanating from Guinea, the Mellacourie, Fourecaria and Bereira. Much of this area, extending far into northern Sierra Leone and including Rio Pongas and Rio Nunez in Guinea was once known collectively as Mellacourie.

Until its recent notoriety, hardly anyone emerging into Yenga from the humungous grassed and potholed road would take any particular notice; the more important places were Kailahun, Koindu, Bomaru and Sienga on the Sierra Leonean side and Guekecdou and Forecariah on the Guinean side. It was a sleepy fishing hamlet, separated from Guinea by the Moa river. However, this cartographic factor was purely fictive for the people living on both sides of the river: movement from Sierra Leone into Guinea and vice versa was unrestrained by border guards, and people on either side of the river maintained families on both sides.

Believe it or not, this was exactly the vision of the colonial powers, Britain and France, when they demarcated the area between the two competing empires. The new political and geographical reality was only expressed in the two dozen or so beacons planted by the Europeans, over them flying two flags at the close of the 19th century. They rudely separated the Kissy people and even separated families living in the area, forcing them into states they never bargained for. The border demarcation wasn't exactly as perfunctory as the carving out of Uganda, given as a birthday gift to Britain's Queen Victoria by an English adventurer marauding through East Africa, but the logic was the same: there was scant consideration for the Africans living in these places and of course no concern about the future viability of the hastily created states. It is mainly for this reason that Amos Sawyer has made the important suggestion, as of yet not taken up elsewhere, that more concrete steps should be taken towards a political union of all three Mano river basin states (Sierra Leone, Guinea and Liberia).

So why do people in the poverty-stricken and militarily disabled Sierra Leone and Guinea, who just recently emerged from brutal wars (with Guinea still crippled by political instability) speak about this strip of land as though they want to ignite another violent conflict in the region? There is obviously a need for a serious reality check.

I recently spent a grim afternoon with a very senior (and overfed) Sierra Leonean army officer who told me rather blithely and against all available evidence that all the Sierra Leonean military needed was the order from 'the civilians' and Yenga would be recaptured from the Guineans promptly. And as I write, there is a virtual movement in Sierra Leone quaintly named 'Save Yenga Save Salone', a campaign that has attracted media activists, poets, 'civil society' and some politicians. One such politician, Musa Tamba Sam, belonging to the opposition Sierra Leone Peoples Party (SLPP) recently tried to get Yenga debated in parliament, but the effort was wisely rebuffed by the speaker. The issue, the speaker said, was being handled diplomatically by the government. The honourable Sam is from Yenga, born at a time when the village was still part of the Kissi-Teng Chiefdom in Kailuhun District in the Eastern Province of Sierra Leone.

The (uncharacteristic) restraint of the Ernest Koroma government on the Yenga issue, which mirrors that of the previous Kabbah's, is admirable. If every serious national issue since Koroma came to power would have been approached the same way, calmly and deliberately, then a lot of the serious errors of judgment - the churlish sacking of civil officials believed to be supporters of the opposition, attacks on opposition infrastructure and many other acts of venality and peevishness that his government has committed - would have been avoided.

The Yenga issue is, as hinted above, the legacy of two searing historical factors: European colonialism and a brutal post-colonial civil war. Surprisingly, both now carry equal resonance. However, for all the right reasons the emphasis should be on the more recent past. For Guinea entered Yenga not as an enemy but as a friend in pursuit of a common enemy, a 'rebel' force of medieval barbarity. Guinea, in fact, has been a very good neighbour of Sierra Leone, on countless occasions coming to the aid of the desperately inept Sierra Leonean army as well as taking up tens of thousands of Sierra Leoneans fleeing the depredations of the rebels, as refugees. I will return to this point, but first to the colonial provenance.

Ian Brownlie's 'African Boundaries: A Legal and Diplomatic Encyclopaedia', published by Hurst (London) for the Royal Institute of International Affairs in 1979, at 1355 pages long is the invaluable guide to the historical basis of African borders. I picked up a copy at Hurst's offices in London recently. The book reproduces a number of documents, including agreements and letters and memoranda from British and French officials which formed the basis of the Sierra Leone-Guinea border. The first was the Anglo-French Convention of 28 June 1882 (preceding the Berlin Conference which officially partitioned the African continent among the Europeans, by two years). The British recognised French claims to Mellacourie (of which, as I noted earlier, Yenga would have formed a part) which now meant French control of the entire Futa Jallon region, the basis of their colony of Guinea. Article 11 of the convention stated that the 'Island of Yelboyah and all islands claimed or possessed by Great Britain on the West Coast of Africa lying to the south ... as far as the southern limit of the ... colony of Sierra Leone' shall henceforth be recognised by France as belonging to Great Britain and the 'Matacong and all islands claimed or possessed by France on the West Coast of Africa to the north ... as far as Rio Nunez' shall be recognised by Great Britain as belonging to France.

This document is rather imprecise when broken down into parts and successive agreements between the two European powers would modify it considerably. In fact, the present border was only firmly agreed on in 1912-13. The original agreement, for example, placed Pamalap and a large part of Kabala District under French jurisdiction. However, pressure from British merchants (the area was lucrative in the groundnut trade) forced the British authorities to renegotiate with the French. Consequently, these places were ceded to the British. Then British Foreign Secretary Sir Edward Grey, who never visited West Africa, proposed the final adjustments in January 1911. The new agreement defined the Moa or Makona river as the physical boundary dividing the two entities; none of the documents - which are exact about place names and physical conditions ('ruined villages', etc.) - mention Yenga. It almost certainly did not exist at the time. But the final protocol delimiting the boundary is precise: 'the frontier ... follows the thalweg [a line connecting the lowest points of successive cross-sections of a valley] of the River Meli [from Guinea] to its meeting with the Moa, or Makona, on the understanding that the islands marked by Letters A and B on the attached map belong to France and that the island marked C belongs to Great Britain.' The protocol, signed at Pendembu on 1 July 1912, accepted Grey's proposal that within six months of the signing of the agreement 'the natives in the transferred territories shall be permitted to cross the frontier to settle on the other side and to carry with them their portable property and harvested crops.'

Grey had also proposed - and this was accepted - that where 'a river forms the boundary, the populations on both banks shall have equal rights of fishing'. And there's the rub. What if something more valuable than fish, oil or diamonds say, are found in the river? How would this agreement work? The agreement simply said that the use of 'hydraulic power' in the river would only be authorised by agreement between the two states. Furthermore, using a river as a boundary is problematic, since rivers can dry up (there is the greenhouse effect, which no one knew about then) and damming can change the course of any river.

In fact, it all worked well until the recent war in Sierra Leone and with it, the Revolutionary United Front's (RUF) discovery of diamonds in the Moa and subsequent Guinean occupation, initialised by RUF incursions into Guinea. It worked rather too well, in fact. Graham Greene, idling for a day or so at that border area in the early 1930s walked from Kailahun into Guinea (then French Guinea), but of course he does not mention Yenga in his classic travel book of this West African trip, 'Journey without Maps' as almost certainly, he wouldn't have taken notice. The border between the two colonies, Greene wrote, 'is the Moa River, about twice the width of Thames at Westminster'. Then Greene makes a very sapient observation: 'The curious thing about these boundaries, a line of river in a waste of bush, no passports, no Customs, no barriers to wandering tribesmen, is that they are as distinct as a European boundary; stepping out of a canoe one was in a different country. Even nature had changed; instead of forest ... a narrow path ran straight forward for mile after mile through tall treeless elephant grass.'

I recently visited the area. The lush rainforest on the Sierra Leonean side that so impressed Greene has been largely denuded by unrestrained logging activity, generally no husbandry, etc. One now sees the same humungous or elephant grass that Greene saw on the Guinean side harassing the tiny motor road leading to Yenga. Guinean troops are now firmly in control and recently forced a Sierra Leone political contingent to disarm its security before entering the place.

A bad sign, but in fact it was not always like that. The problem began in September 2000 when the RUF attacked a number of Guinean border towns south of the capital, Conakry. The area had become home to tens of thousands of Sierra Leonean refugees fleeing attacks on civilians inside Sierra Leone, part of the RUF's 10-year campaign of terror and destruction in that country. Not long afterwards, the RUF attacked Guinean towns and villages in the 'Parrot's Beak' area of the country, emerging from Sierra Leone and from points along the Liberian border. Here they caused much greater destruction and dislocation, driving Guineans out of their homes along with as many as 75,000 Sierra Leonean refugees who had been living on the Guinean side of the border for several years.

The RUF attacks attracted little attention, except as a humanitarian footnote to the more notorious conflict in Sierra Leone. I spent two weeks in Guinea at the time researching a report for Partnership Africa Canada and I reported then that Guineans themselves appeared to be confused. Following rebel attacks on Forecariah, less than 100km from the capital Conakry and home to tens of thousands of refugees from Sierra Leone and Liberia, in early September 2000 the Guinean President Lansana Conté broadcast an inflammatory statement on state radio and television. He blamed the incursions on the refugees, provoking widespread attacks by Guinean police, soldiers and civilian militias on the already traumatised refugees.

The attacks on Forecariah, by RUF rebels operating from Kabala, a Sierra Leonean town close to the Guinean border, were diversionary and the rebels withdrew without much resistance after Guinean forces counter-attacked. However, better planned and more coordinated incursions were soon to follow. In January 2001 the RUF moved from Sierra Leone, along with Charles Taylor's forces into the diamond-rich areas around Macenta (in the so-called Forest Region), Madina Oula (near Kindia) and the important trading city of Guéckedou, which like Forecariah, was home to tens of thousands of refugees. The attacks on Macenta and the destruction of Guéckedou alerted Guineans to the seriousness of the crisis. The attacks quickly spread, threatening to engulf the districts around Bonankoro.

Then finally Guinea responded proportionately. With crucial help from the United States (which maintained an annual C-JET training program with the Guinean army) and France, Guinea acquired some armoured helicopters and some old MiG fighter bombers which were used to pound rebel bases in both Sierra Leone and Liberia. Guinea also helped to train over 1,000 Donsos (the Kono name for Kamajors or the Civil Defence Forces) made up of Konos and Kissis from the Yenga area and Kono District, all along the Guinea-Sierra Leone border, deploying them against the RUF. I saw about a thousand of them during my visit and also saw British officers who had an open-ended military commitment to Sierra Leone, helping to train the Guineans and the Donsu militia. Guinea routed the RUF, helping to accelerate the disarmament process in Sierra Leone; in effect, Guinea defeated the RUF. It then occupied the Sierra Leonean side of the border, including Yenga.

After the war ended, Kabbah negotiated the withdrawal of most of the Guinean forces but renegade officers, now engaged in lucrative mining at Yenga, refused to move and the ailing Guinean leader was simply a hostage of the military. An agreement was signed on 15 November 2002, months after the war officially ended by Sierra Leone's internal affairs minister the late Hinga Norman and his Guinean counterpart, El-Haj Moussa Solano, affirming the colonial-era border agreement. But the agreement was not conclusive, it called for the setting-up of a committee to work towards a resolution that would restore Yenga to Sierra Leone but assure Guinean border security - a very legitimate issue obviously. But the talks have become open-ended and there is no assurance that Yenga will be restored to Sierra Leone soon, or perhaps ever at the current pace.

Personally, I see little problem with the Guinean presence at Yenga, but clearly it is a volatile issue, what with the attempt to politicise it. But all loose talk about reclaiming the village by force should be discouraged. Inflammatory steps by some NGOs like World Vision's (a notoriously vulgar group which is in the habit of showing poor and sick black and brown kids on TV to raise money) which a couple of years ago claimed that it was prevented from building a school at Yenga by Guinean troops, should be firmly suppressed. Many of the impoverished villages on both sides of the border do not have functioning schools, so why pick on beleaguered Yenga?

The flamboyant Sierra Leonean Defence Minister Paolo Conteh has been quoted saying that there is no point in negotiating with the Guinean junta since it has not been recognised by either the Economic Community Of West African States (ECOWAS) or the African Union (AU). He has a point, though it is utterly impolitic of him to have gone public with such a statement; street corner talk has its place, but it should be allowed in the Defence Ministry or State House.

While President Koroma can make his very loud votaries and supporters feel good by declaring that Sierra Leone and Guinea are sister countries who are working together to resolve the Yenga issue without resort to international mediating bodies, the overheated rhetoric elsewhere is not reassuring. I think it is time that ECOWAS takes tentative steps to engage both nations on the issue. There is a clear early warning signal here...

Lansana Gberie is a Sierra Leonean academic and journalist.