Terrorism Threatens African Development

             Since the days of African independence, the continent has been bedeviled by internal and external conflicts – from coups like the recent one in Guinea Bissau and the many successful and unsuccessful attempts during the 1960s-70s to ongoing internal conflicts over resources such as in Nigeria’s Niger Delta and the post-election violence in Kenya in 2007. Then there are the conflicts between nations such as the Uganda-Tanzania conflict (1978-79) and those internal conflicts that involve other nations such as the current Tigray war in Ethiopia.

            However, the threat of terrorist attacks is a bane to even relatively peaceful nations. When al-Shabaab attacked the Westgate Mall shopping center in Kenya in 2013, there undoubtedly was a negative impact on tourism to Kenya, especially given the 2015 shooting at Garissa University College, the 2019 hotel bombing in Nairobi and the continuing threat of attacks by al-Shabab.

            Even now, the U.S. Department of State has listed Kenya on October 4 of this year as having a Level 2 travel advisory due to crime, terrorism, civil unrest, and kidnapping.

            “Terrorist attacks have occurred with little or no warning, targeting Kenyan and foreign government facilities, tourist locations, transportation hubs, hotels, resorts, markets/shopping malls, and places of worship. Terrorist acts have included armed assaults, suicide operations, bomb/grenade attacks, and kidnappings,” the advisory states.

            It is difficult to quantify what Kenya has lost in total tourism because of this warning and those posted by other countries. Kenya has consistently received more than two million tourists annually, albeit with periodic slumps for assorted reasons, including the COVID lockdown on travel. The Government of Kenya has plans to reach the level of three million tourists by 2030, but to achieve this, the threat of terrorism must be minimized as a factor.

Many of those tourists are potential investors and partners of Kenyan businesses. Moreover, anyone wanting to do significant business on the ground in Kenya would face insurance risk concerns, especially for any facilities to be built there. There is no quantifying what investment Kenya could have had but for terrorism concerns.

            Not long after the Westgate Mall attack, the International Crisis Group produced a report that made recommendations on how to handle terrorism without making the situation worse:

“Authorities should avoid blanket arrests and extrajudicial killings, involve local leaders in efforts to tackle recruitment, while taking steps to address broader grievances that al-Shabaab taps into in its narrative, including the political and economic exclusion of Muslim minorities in East Africa,” according to the report.

These recommendations jibe with a subsequent United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) report on what leads people to join extremist groups.

“I am convinced that the creation of open, equitable, inclusive and pluralist societies, based on the full respect of human rights and with economic opportunities for all, represents the most tangible and meaningful alternative to violent extremism,” United Nations Secretary-General António Guterres stated in the agency’s report – Journey to Extremism in Africa: Drivers, Incentives and the Tipping Point for Recruitment.

Acknowledging that the evidence base concerning the causes, consequences and trajectories informing violent extremism – and what works in preventing it – remains weak globally. The UNDP report states that this is particularly true in Africa when compared to other regions. Nevertheless, the UNDP report states that disaffection with government is highest by significant margins among the Journey to Extremism respondents who were recruited by violent extremist groups across several key indicators.

 “These include belief that government only looks after the interests of a few; low level of trust in government authorities; and experience, or willingness to report experience, of bribe-paying. Grievances against security actors, as well as politicians, are particularly marked, with an average of 78 percent rating low levels of trust in the police, politicians and military,” according to the UNDP report.

 “Those most susceptible to recruitment express a significantly lower degree of confidence in the potential for democratic institutions to deliver progress or meaningful change. Meanwhile, positive experience of effective service provision is confirmed as a source of resilience: respondents who believed that governments’ provision of education was either ‘excellent’ or ‘improving’ were less likely to be a member of a violent extremist group, within the sample.”

             The UNDP reports that Africa faces a unique vulnerability to violent extremism that is shaped by persistent underdevelopment and incomplete peacebuilding and state-building in key regions and cited immense challenges faced by governments in delivering peace and stability, and in ensuring that the pace and benefits of growth keep up with the expansion of the most youthful population in the world.

There are several areas of Africa where conflict over resources, religion, territory and other factors make them susceptible to terrorism exacerbating existing tensions and conflicts. At the top of the list is the nearly two-year-long conflict in Ethiopia’s Tigray region. Previously considered a high-flying African economy, Ethiopia has become a major humanitarian and human rights concern, and U.S. sanctions, including suspension from the African Growth and Opportunity Act program, have hindered commerce and certainly investment. An ongoing terrorist threat from al-Shabaab and ISIS from Somalia is a major concern for the Ethiopian government, and the Tigray conflict distracts enough attention from this extremist threat.

Cameroon’s civil conflict has produced numerous reports of human rights abuses in the English-speaking southern region. Attacks by Boko Haram and ISIS-West Africa have contributed to the chaos in regions of Cameroon, especially in the Far North Region, which have not gotten the attention of the Ethiopian conflict but are no less destructive for that country. A business climate already limited by corruption and weak governance has seen further trepidation by investors despite the accelerated completion of development projects because of the country’s hosting of the Africa Cup of Nations soccer tournament in early 2022.

Nigeria has been rife with terrorist and extremist threats. A Fulani extremist element has run rampant in northern Nigeria, which also is beleaguered by Boko Haram and a Shiite threat that has been genuinely concerning to the region’s Sunni majority. Meanwhile, northern extremists have targeted Ibos and has sparked a secessionist movement reminiscent to the Biafra conflict. Furthermore, the southern threat of terrorist-criminal groups has not been extinguished despite efforts to mollify them with government payouts. Kidnappings have continued by terrorist groups and criminal gangs. Obviously, this has chilled investment interest in Nigeria, already experiencing a reluctance of foreign oil companies to expand potentially lucrative onshore drilling due to security concerns.

The Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) has seen almost constant conflict in the past couple of decades that threatened to tear the country asunder. Two civil wars have dragged in many of the country’s neighbors. Armed actors in civil struggles in neighboring Rwanda and Burundi have spilled over into DRC, and along with Ugandan rebel groups, produced at least two dozen terrorist elements that have made areas of eastern DRC nearly ungovernable. Mining of critical minerals on which the outside world depends, therefore, has become ever more perilous.

Mozambique, a fast-rising economy in southern Africa, has experienced almost Biblical troubles – from natural disasters to disease outbreaks to terrorism. The prospective of abundant energy supplies in that country has been threatened by exceedingly violent terrorist activity that would have doomed a major project in the Cabo Delgado region without international security assistance and interventions. It is hoped that such aid will have a long-term beneficial impact on a country with largely untapped natural resources.

There are many reasons why African business climates are not attractive to foreign investors even though products continue to be sold to the continent’s growing middle class, with the African Continental Free Trade area promising to harmonize standards and regulations to make trade in Africa more attractive. However, terrorism is the dark cloud on the horizon that must be effectively addressed if the dreams of industrialization and economic development are to become a reality. Catching up with the rest of the world in manufacturing will require enormous sums to be invested, but concerns about security will put a hold on the wallets of investors, drive away technologically savvy workers and make life a living hell for citizens across Africa.

Terrorism is often stimulated and facilitated by outside actors, so while African governments must do better in addressing this plague, international actors must do their part as well. The impact of terrorism in Africa affects more than the continent and must be deal with as the existential threat that it is.