The United Nations Security Council has been told that the failure of
Nigerian leaders to deal with diversity was the root cause of the
Biafran crisis.
The person who made the presentation, was South Africa´s former
president Thabo Mbeki, who lived in Nigeria for a few years in the late
70s during the anti-apartheid struggle.
Mbeki addressed the UN Security Council on Tuesday and listed African
countries, apart from Nigeria, where the failure to deal with diversity
was a root cause of conflict.
He blamed the current clashes in Ethiopia´s Tigray region, also on the failure to manage diversity.
Mbeki recalled that the Nigerian government was victorious
against secessionist-seeking Biafra 50 years ago and its leaders
announced “that they would follow a policy of no victor, no vanquished.”
Looking at the “painful example” of the ongoing conflict between
the Ethiopian government and ethnic Tigrayans, Mbeki said, “this is
exactly what Ethiopia needs.”
Thabo Mbeki cited “the centrality of failure properly to manage
diversity” in the conflicts in Congo, Burundi, Ivory Coast and Sudan.
He pointed to the 2004 report of the Sierra Leone Truth and
Reconciliation Commission “which tells the naked truth, that it was as a
result of the failure to manage diversity that the country experienced a
very costly 11-year war which started in 1991” — and there is a similar
failure to manage diversity “in the violent conflict which has been and
is still going on in Cameroon.”
France´s U.N. ambassador, Nicolas De Riviere, had some additions.
In the Sahel region stretching across northern Africa between the
Atlantic Ocean and the Red Sea, “terrorist groups use differences to
stir up hatred between communities,” he said.
And ethnic and religious violence is also prevalent in the Middle East including Iraq, Yemen and Syria.
They spoke at a U.N. Security Council meeting on “Diversity,
State Building and the Search for Peace” that was organized by Kenya,
which holds the council presidency this month, and chaired by its
president, Uhuru Kenyatta.
“The key message I wish to deliver today is that poor management of
diversity is leading to grave threats to international peace and
security,” Kenyatta said.
He said inequality within and between countries “is too often the
result of exclusion on the basis of identity” that becomes
institutionalized in governments and in economic relations.
“And it manifests in stereotyping and bigotry,” leading among other
consequences to lack of work for billions of people simply based on who
they are, he said.
“The result is a profound sense of grievance and bitterness that populists and demagogues can easily exploit,” Kenyatta said.
“It is fodder for terrorism, insurgencies, the rise of xenophobia, hate speech, divisive tribalism, as well as racism.”
U.N. Secretary-General Antonio Guterres cited a U.N.-World Bank
study that found “many conflicts are deeply rooted in longstanding
inequalities among groups,” which leave people feeling excluded and
marginalized because they are denied opportunities based on their
culture, race, skin colour, ethnicity or income.
He pointed to the sharp increase in armed groups at the heart of
conflicts — “rebels, insurgents, militias, criminal gangs and armed
trafficking, terrorist and extremist groups” — as well as a rise in
military coups.
While combatants can agree to end hostilities, Guterres warned,
“without including a wide range of diverse voices at every step of this
process — without bringing all people along — any peace will be
short-lived.”
He said that women and young people must be “meaningful
participants” and that “when we open the door to inclusion and
participation, we take a giant step forward in conflict prevention and
peacebuilding.”
Fawzia Koofi, the first woman to be deputy speaker of
Afghanistan´s Parliament who left the country after the Taliban takeover
on Aug. 15, said her country is the latest test of whether the global
community can come together to uphold the principles of the U.N.
Charter, including promoting the rule of law, justice and equality for
men and women.
“There are serious reports that fundamental freedoms are being flouted,” she said.
“Women and girls are once again regarded as second-class
citizens, literally. They are making us invisible again … (and)
thousands of people from religious minorities and other minority groups
are forced to flee their villages.”
Koofi said the Afghan situation shows how the imbalance in power is “at the roots of so much conflict and inequality.”
Rwandan President Paul Kagame, whose country was the scene of
genocide in 1994 in which 800,000 Tutsis and moderate Hutus were
massacred by the majority Hutu population., said sustainable peace can
only be built if the root causes of conflict are understood by a broad
range of the population, and it requires dialogue and search for
solutions.
“It may not be possible to entirely prevent all conflict,” he
said. “In fact, disagreements and grievances will always be there in one
form or another. But the intensity and the impact of conflicts can be
minimized by remaining attentive to local needs” and delivering “the
results that citizens expect and deserve.”
