Ethiopia’s parliament
this week voted to push ahead with the country’s controversial Blue Nile
hydroelectric dam project. The move is bound to raise the political
stakes even higher following threats earlier this week by Egypt that it
would go to war over Ethiopia’s plan to build a $4.7-billion dam on the
great river.
Egypt claims that construction of the dam in Ethiopia will cause
grave detriment to its supply of fresh water and spell ruin to its
economy.
Most of Egypt’s 85 million people live on the banks of the Nile and
the country relies on the river for over 95 per cent of its fresh water
supply. For millennia, Egyptian civilization has depended on the
bountiful Nile - the world’s longest river, stretching more than 6,500
kilometers from its source in Central Africa to its outlet in the
Mediterranean Sea, just north of Egypt’s capital, Cairo.
The Nile comprises two tributaries: the longer White Nile originates
in Burundi or Rwanda (still a matter of dispute among geographers) and
it meets with the Blue Nile coming out of Ethiopia. The meeting point is
near Khartoum, the capital of North Sudan, and thence the Nile flows on
to Egypt. However, it is Ethiopia’s Blue Nile that provides more than
85 per cent of the downstream water of the Lower Nile.
That is why the construction of the mega dam in Ethiopia has
apparently provoked so much alarm in Egypt. Ethiopia’s Blue Nile
hydroelectric project - the biggest in Africa - has been on the drawing
board for several years, initiated by the country’s late prime minister,
Meles Zenawi, who died last year. At the end of last month, Ethiopia
began diverting the water of the Blue Nile to enable construction of the
dam.
Egypt has responded now with dire calls of national emergency, led
by its president, Mohammed Morsi. This week Morsi said that his country
reserved the right to militarily defend its vital national interests.
“All options are on the table,” he said, adding that any drop of
water lost would be replaced by Egyptian blood. Morsi has since toned
down the war rhetoric towards Ethiopia.
But, nevertheless, the relations between Africa’s second and third
most populous countries remain extremely fraught, especially in light of
the latest move by Ethiopia’s lawmakers to push ahead with the dam.
Some Salafist members of Egypt’s parliament have even called for covert
sabotage of the dam, which at this stage is about 20 per cent complete.
Those calls prompted the Ethiopians this week to summon the Egyptian
ambassador in Addis Ababa to explain his country’s declared baleful
intentions.
Ethiopia’s concerns will have only been underscored by talking
points released also this week by the Pentagon-aligned think-tank,
Stratfor, which weighed up Egypt’s options of military sabotage,
including air strikes and demolition by Special Forces.
So, what is going on here? Nobody is denying that the Nile is a
vital national interest for Egypt. But it seems a reckless and
outrageous leap of hysteria by Egypt to launch threats of war against
Ethiopia over the issue.
Ethiopia’s prime minister, Hailemariam Desalegn, has vowed that the
Blue Nile hydroelectric scheme is not intended to adversely affect the
flow of water to Egypt or Sudan. His view is supported by a recent study
conducted by technical people from Egypt, Sudan and Ethiopia, which
concluded that there would be no significant long-term reduction in
downstream water supply as a result the dam.
However, without presenting contrary expert evidence, Egypt’s Morsi
asserts that his country’s water supply will be curtailed by 20 per cent
- a reduction that would indeed be catastrophic for the already
drought-prone North African country. But this is the big question: is
Egypt’s supply of fresh water really threatened? The scientific study so
far would say not.
That raises the further question: why is president Morsi making such
a big deal about Ethiopia’s Blue Nile project? The answer may be less
to do with Ethiopia diverting water and more to do with Morsi diverting
political problems within his own country.
Later this month, on 30 June, there is a mass opposition rally
planned in Cairo to mark the first anniversary of Morsi taking office.
The Muslim Brotherhood president has seen a very rocky first year in
power, with many Egyptians not happy with his policies since he took
over from the ousted dictator Hosni Mubarak.
Top of the popular grievances against Morsi is his support for
Salafist extremists in NATO’s covert regime-change war in Syria; his
continuing collusion with Israel in its oppression of Palestinians; and,
domestically, Morsi has been accused of doing little to improve the
living standards of Egypt’s majority of impoverished workers and
families.
Morsi’s belligerent rhetoric over Ethiopia’s Blue Nile project has
sought to divert internal opposition to his government into an
international dispute with a neighbouring African country.
In his fiery speeches recently, Morsi has been working the crowds
with jingoism and nationalism, stressing that Egyptians are “at one”
over their claimed rights to the Nile water. The obvious theme here by
Morsi is to convince Egyptians to put aside their objections to his
dubious governance and to focus instead on an ostensible external enemy -
Ethiopia.
Let’s look at the issue from Ethiopia’s point of view. The Blue Nile
is geographically a national resource of Ethiopia. It originates from
the country’s northern highlands, which drain into Lake Tana, one of
Africa’s largest lakes. From there, the Blue Nile meanders northwards on
its long journey to the Mediterranean.
The river might be more accurately called the Brown Nile because of
its muddy colour owing to the fertile minerals and organic matter that
it leaches from the Ethiopian land. This is partly why the Nile has
sustained Egypt’s agriculture for millennia - it is a river of natural
goodness courtesy of Ethiopia’s rich soil.
But the way Ethiopians see it - and they have just cause - is why
should their country not be the first beneficiary of the powerful and
fertile water of the Nile?
After all, ask Ethiopians, does Egypt give away its natural oil and
gas wealth to other countries for free? No, so why should Ethiopia
permit its primary water resource to be freely accessed by others at the
cost of its own pressing development needs?
