Something About The Law

This morning, I awoke to a chorus of crickets, birds and frogs. Alarmingly, the compound’s amphibian friends shriek like demented babies. My tent does not zip-up, so I shined my head torch onto the floor (as the security brief urged), to verify that I had acquired no snake comrades.

My tent was serenely peaceful. As I looked out, I saw the reed roofs of circular Tukuls and a line of elegant women entering the compound, dressed in bright yellow wraps. It was not long until they brought out a pot of Mandazi – twists of fried dough.

Breakfast here consists of Mandazi with jam served ceremoniously in a mug, and a warm drink of coffee-like granules soaked in hot water. I’m not quite sure what this drink consists of, since it tastes neither like coffee nor tea, yet is palatable with powdered milk.

I had the privilege of sharing breakfast with a Sudanese colleague who had his ear close to the ground in Abyei.

As he explained, Abyei is not technically a state. Before the PCA decision, it formed part of Southern Kordofan but maintained an independent administration. The administration rules the payams, which in turn govern the bomas and villages.

The Government of Sudan recognizes two ethnic groups in Abyei: the Ngok Dinka and the nomadic Misseriya Arab. The Chief Administrator of Abyei (selected by Bashir) is Ngok Dinka and the Deputy Chief Administrator is Misseriya.

As I learnt during my security briefing, the principal cause of conflict in Abyei is Misseriya cattle migration. During the rainy season, the Misseriya follow the water into grazing lands inhabited by Ngok Dinka.

UNMIS has attempted to disarm the Ngok Dinka and, in return, conveyed to the Misseriya that they can have safe passage provided that they travel without weaponry. This approach has created a Sudanese-flavoured prisoners’ dilemma. The Misseriya don’t trust that the Dinka remain unarmed, so they travel armed-to-the-teeth. Often, these weapons are more than Misseriya require to protect cattle and can cause serious harm to civilians. This trend, in turn, takes the wind out of the UNMIS disarmament campaign.

The Misseriya are now moving with the rains. They should not travel close to Agok. I am relieved that UNMIS monitors the Misseriya migration closely.

Another current of instability is the precarious position of the Abyei Administration. Khartoum agreed to fund the administration, but it appears that it has not honoured its promises. The Government of South Sudan also declared it would constribute. In practice, neither authority has assumed responsibility for the Abyei budget, which has bred distrust of the North in particular.

I asked my colleague what he predicted for January. He asserted that, back to 1905, Abyei has forged alliances with North or South contingent on strategic interests. The North’s fickle behaviour regarding the budget may drive Abyei to choose secession with the South after the referendum. For an account of how the Misseriya might view this scenario, please watch this.

The Abyei Administration’s budgetary struggles have had other perverse effects. The administration can gather few taxes because of the ongoing IDP situation. Few of Abyei’s residents have returned or resettled. This means that the administration relies on NGOs more than any other source for service delivery. NGO resources fill a gap which, if ignored, could precipitate humanitarian crisis. However, NGOs’ service delivery in Abyei presents an archetypal case of external actors assuming state functions. Where NGOs aim to build citizen-government accountability and strong state institutions, such aid can prove a double-edged sword.

In the ideal world, development practitioners avoid a host of ethical and sustainability issues if they keep humanitarian aid separate from development work. Yet, in environments like Abyei, agencies cannot – and should not – treat humanitarian aid and development as mutually exclusive. Here, people face a long-run humanitarian crisis with perennial political roots rather than a “flash” cause like a natural disaster.

The development purist might say: Forget the humanitarian crisis and reliance on NGO service delivery. What these communities need are solid governance processes so they can provide services autonomously. People might suffer in the short-term – a necessary sacrifice for stability and independence in the medium-run.

But it is heartless to ignore extensive human suffering and simplistic to assume that people who have no access to public goods can serve as the active citizens that accountable state service delivery mechanisms require. NGOs here acknowledge that they have left the crisis phase on the humanitarian aid-development continuum. But this moment of transition – where agencies fill humanitarian gaps but conduct development initiatives – is one that can either yield dependence and stoke conflict or build a stable base for populations to pursue their aspirations.

The programme that I am working with confronts all these challenges. I shall be fascinated to see how it is navigating these treacherous waters of transition.

For more information on post-conflict service delivery and citizen-government accountability, I highly recommend Uvin, Lund and Cohen, Building Civil Society in Post-Conflict Environments: From Micro to Macro (November 2006).

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