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Farewell to wars, Africa gears up for revival
(Xinhua)
Updated: 2005-12-10 13:22
A continent whose potentials long confined by not only the reality, but also
the perception, of poverty, conflict and disease, Africa has been held back in
nearly every aspect of development as the rest of the world excel in areas of
their respective strength.
However, in the year 2005, this disastrous and conflict-ridden continent
seemed to have caught a glimpse of ways out of this vicious circle of stagnation
and pessimism. The countries are gearing up for an overdue revival and probably
a last-minute opportunity to board the train of growth, before it's gone for
good.
BE COOL, CONTINENT-WIDE
Nearly incessant conflicts have depicted Africa through the world's media in
people's eyes as an unsafe continent, heaven for warlords ready to ruin the
wealth of a nation for his own profit, and paradise for corrupt officials who
look after their own bank accounts by taking advantage of impunity endemic in
conflict zones. But the tide is turning, as key governments and Pan-African
bodies such as the African Union go an extra mile to solve conflicts that have
paralyzed the economies in hotspots and impacted, at the least, negatively on
the whole continent.
In January this year, the Sudanese government and southern rebels signed a
comprehensive peace accord in Nairobi, culminating two years of peace process to
end the 21-year-old civil war in southern Sudan, the longest-running in Africa.
The Sudanese civil war broke out in 1983 when the rebels took up arms
fighting for self-determination in the southern part of the country. It is
estimated that two decades of conflict have claimed 2 million lives, primarily
from war-induced famine and diseases, and displaced over 4 million others. The
peace accord is expected to usher in stability and development for the south,
and the broader neighboring areas.
The Great Lakes region, which used to be the fuse of conflicts in the whole
of Africa, is making rapid progress in ethnic reconciliation and peace process.
Ten years after the genocide that claimed an estimated 800,000 lives and tore
apart the social fabric, Rwanda is now the exemplar in national reconciliation
and reconstruction.
In neighboring Burundi, which has suffered similar ethnic conflicts, the
presidential elections in August ended a transitional period following decades
of ethnic feud. Pierre Nkurunziza, a former Hutu rebel leader, took the helm of
the tiny central African country, pledging to bring Hutus and Tutsis together.
In the turbulent Democratic Republic of the Congo, thousands who had fled
have returned to register for a vote scheduled before June 2006. The vote will
be the country's first in 45 years.
Not surprisingly, at the end of a UN Security Council mission to the Great
Lakes area last month, the head of the delegation said that compared to two
years earlier, when he was on a similar tour in the region, the situation has
improved markedly.
"We are profoundly impressed with the positive developments particularly in
the Democratic Republic of the Congo and Burundi," Jean-Marc de la Sabliere,
France's ambassador to the UN, who led the 15-member delegation, said at a news
conference in Dar es Salaam, Tanzania.
"Relations between countries in the region are also encouraging, " he said.
Encouraging developments also emerged in Liberia, a country notorious for
decades of bloody conflicts and coups, and its governments' and rebels' roles in
the volatility of the whole west Africa, foreign observers have praised the
presidential election in November, in which Ellen Johnson-Sirleaf was voted the
first female president in Africa. Liberians are expecting the elections will
mark a departure from war to lasting peace and stability in a country rich in
rubber, timber, iron ore, diamond and gold as well as fertile soil.
Somalia, the lawless Horn of Africa nation that early this year has moved its
transitional federal government back home from Kenya, is beginning
reconstruction after more than a decade of factional warfare, although the
process is still haunted by insecurity, infighting and pirates that roam free
along the country's 3,000-km long coastline.
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