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Africa needs peace in order to develop

Despite  being the richest continent in culture, resources and tradition Africa has yet to enjoy peace, a Red Cross volunteer and the National co-ordinator of The Youths of Ambassadors of the Gambia, Mr. Fabakary Kalley  has said.

 Speaking during an interview, Kalley said peace is absolutely essential for human life, especially in national and international development.

 He said the international support for peace keeping and related emergency relief has made a difference in the conflict resolution continue in Africa.

But there is still a need to promote international awareness and assistance for the proactive management of peace consolidation that would foster sustainable development.

 “Possibilities must be explored that would simultaneously address the political, economic, health, social and institutional dimension of the crises.” Kalley said.

 He said peace agreements are critical foundations for stability. Consolidating this foundation demands a long-term process of rebuilding the physical infrastructure for a new culture of peace among the nations and their citizens of all ages, especially the young.

 Development should be an integral part of that foundation. Because peace and development activities are not only mutually reinforcing, neither can exist without the other.

 Kalley  said there was, and is, no one moment at which war or conflict ceases and peace begin. This can be associated with various factors, which may include:

 The proliferation of small arms. There is a continuous flood of small arms such as handguns, AK47, granules, landmines etc in to Africa. Arms command power and some people did not know how to use this, especially those communities that cannot even manufacture a nail.

 It also set back many African countries, characterized by continued difficulties in the socio-political situation, sporadic raids in the countryside, i.e. half peace, and the governments shear inability and lack of resources to take action.

 The intervention of military junta through coup d’tats, claiming to be liberators of their people from bad governance. This halts the peace of democracy and democratisation and in most case abuse of human and people’s right.

 Even the claims of good governance and democracy are marked with arrest and harassment of opposition or outspoken individuals, corruption, bribery and abuse of human rights becomes the order of the day.

 The desire for change through violent protests because most of African constitutions have no term limits to office.

 Disputes between  neighbouring countries, to which less attention is  paid, because of international public opinion.

 The difficulties in policing war/conflict torn societies towards order and stability like demilitarising and disarming the society. It is coupled with the problem of coordinating multiplicity of peacekeeping programmes and agencies on the continent.

Kalley said the very concept of peace keeping will be an added factor. This resembles the new attitude found in hospitals, where a patient is asked to cut a normal five day stay to only three days and return home because some rooms are needed by other patients.

 Peace keeping on the continent has been related to only one phase of the conflict, namely, post conflict. In many situations only humanitarian relief is considered a priority, and fails to address the security and political dimension.

 He said assistance of this type should be made available also counter various obstacles, among them the exclusion of programmes aimed at restoring an environment of safety and security in many development programs  and the reluctance of donor countries to allocate development fund to such initiatives.

 Kalley called for  a ‘peace fund to specifically finance activities aimed at the establishment of peace, to compliment development aid since peace is a prerequisite for development.

 Other functions should include the issues of integrating those children deprived from basic education into training skills that would make them useful in the society.

 Not withstanding, the efforts of sub regional grouping and the African Union with support from the international community, more work is needed in that regard and it has to show the commitment of the entire African people.

 One of the most remarkable features of the current transactional process is the fact that African countries and people are increasingly taking over responsibilities for the international community.

 This is manifested in the address of the United Nation Secretary General Kofi Annan, and the effort of his predecessor Boutros Boutros Ghali, emphasising the preventive value of good governance in the context of economic, social development and its role in reconciliation and the consolidation of peace.

        There are various sub regional consultative forums on peace initiative at the

political level, where policies and recommendations are made and later transformed in to action. All these are geared towards preventing and resolving conflict in this part of the planet which will have significant contribution to the evolution of good governance all over the world.

 With the support of regional peace keeping forces and the United Nations democracy has being restructured in some conflict areas, ex-combatants disarmed and weapons collected. In some areas they are strengthened by successful reunion into socio-economic life of ex-combatants. This has been done  with the financial support of several donors. Excombatants’ accommodation in the armed forces are measures reform military institutions to make them reflect the gender and ethnic diversity of the army which, in turn, has a  duty to contribute to peace.  

 Kalley said the media  sometimes creates fears that lead to aggression. But the media have  a great role in exposing the real horrors of war and conflict on the content.

 Unfortunately most of these efforts can be  frustrated by a mere single accident leading one to start again at square one.

 Prevention is better than cure and less costly. Development can help in preventing conflicts. But the unfortunate reality is that, this knowledge is not translated into new activities.

 He pointed out therefore the need to create awareness of the importance of preventing either before or after a conflict, through culture of peace, to avoid new conflict, or deterioration or retiring to square one.

To address these problems of under development and inadequacy of basic information, the concept of peace building should relate to all phases of the conflict, that is,. pre-conflict, during conflict and post conflict.

 Assistance should not only be directed to humanitarian relief but also to address the security and political dimension.

 All efforts should be made to include within security programmes measures to stem the uncontrolled export and flood of small arms into Africa.

 This development activities requires identifying and supporting programs of recollection and rebuilding well before the cessation of violence, not necessarily awaiting a formal peace situation otherwise the chance to restore peace will be missed.

 There has to be a comprehensive approach that would, clearly combine the political, economic legal, social, and environmental and health measures within a common framework. The approach necessitated the

 firm enrolment of all people but its control process should lie with the Africans. The international community could only assist and not impure solution.

Therefore we put formal proposal as possible solution in a comprehensive approach under the operational code name in search of peace for Africa, he concluded.