News Analysis By Leo Odera Omolo In Kisumu City.
The last week signing of the new River Nile water agreement by four upstream states, which attended a meeting at Entebbe in Uganda has provoked sharp tongue lashing by Egypt which has threatened to take legal action and any other option it deemed necessary.
The four upstream countries represented at the Entebbe meeting were Uganda, Tanzania, Rwanda and Ethiopia. The Democratic Republic of Congo and Burundi were not represented. Kenya another important member of the Nile basin Initiative was represented by a junior officer, but it has since signed the document.
Kenya’s Water and Irrigation Minister Madam Charity Kaluki Ngilu signed the document in her Nairobi office early this week bringing the number to five countries out of the nine, which include Egypt and Sudan.
The new treaty is over the equitable sharing of the Nile water. It has since elicited strong opposition from Egypt and Sudan. The upstream countries must now be prepared for any consequences as Egypt has vowed not to lay low about.
The signing of the treaty in exclusion of the two North African countries has sparked a bitter row prompting Cairo’s harsh reaction. Egypt has threatened to mobilize international support or “other means”, the possibility of a conventional warfare cannot be ruled out, judging from the tone of Cairo’s rejoinder.
It could be remember that at time Egypt had threatened both Sudan and Ethiopia, saying it was ready to go war with any upstream states whose action is viewed as threatening her only source of life. And to protect its historical rights over the River Nile water, dating back to a century.
“This agreement benefits all of us” remarked Ethiopian Minister for Water Resources Asfaw Dingoma in Entebbe immediately after signing the new treaty.
The latest conflict of interest and disagreement come at the time Egypt is expected to support Ethiopia’s bid, especially after the two countries signing of a memorandum of understanding late last year, to establish a joint Ethiopian-Egyptian Council Trade and Commerce with the aim of strengthening economic ties between the two countries.
The upstream states want to be able to implement irrigation and hydro power projects in consultation with Egypt and Sudan, but with Egypt being disarmed and left without right to exercise its veto power.which Cairo was given by the 1929 colonial era treaty it signed with Great Britain.
The latest agreement signed by the five countries of Ethiopia, Kenya, Tanzania, Uganda and Rwanda, the Nile Basin Co-operation Framework, is to replace a 1959 accord between Egypt and Sudan and British colonial power that gives the two North African countries control of more than 90 per cent of the Nile water flow.
The two countries have expressed fear that the water supply might dwindle and would be severely reduced, f the seven other Nile users diver the river for irrigation and hydro power projects.
The Nile Basin Initiative, which had been spearheading the talks will from now on ward be transformed to be known as Nile Basin Commission and will receive ,review and approve or reject projects related to Africa’s longest river.
The new Commission will have its secretariat based in the Ethiopian capital, Addis Ababa and will have representation from all the nine Nile Basin countries.
Egyptian Foreign Affairs Minister Ahmed Abul Abeit was early this week quoted by news agencies as having issued a stern warning to the upstream states that his country water rights were not.
‘Any unilateral agreement signed by the upstream Nile Basin Countries is null and void, therefore is not binding on downstream countries, Egypt and Sudan, and lacks legitimacy,” said the Minister.
The Egyptian Minister described Ethiopia’s inauguration of 460MW Tana Beles hydro electric dam on the Nile, done at the same day the new agreement was being signed in Entebbe has provoked Egypt into taking action that would turn global opinion of the Nile water among the 9 Nile Basin states.
Ethiopia Prime Minister Meles Zenawi, on the other hand, said the Dam’s recent inauguration marks his country’s success in using Nile water after decades of biased laws.
Ethiopia industry, manufacturing sector has suffered persistent power shortage, whose demand has increased by 25 per cent every year.
Currently, Ethiopia’s power generation capacity is about 2,000MW and the government targets to generate capacity 5,000in the coming five ears and export energy to neighboring Kenya, Sudan and Djibouti.
Tana Beles is an ultra-modern hydro power dam complex is located underground and was constructed at a cost of 550 Birr {USD 369.2 million}
Earlier effort to build the Dam were frustrated by the refusal of the African Development Bank, the World Bank and the European Investment Bank among other creditors to fund the project a situation suspected to have been engineered clandestinely bye Egypt and Sudan.
Ethiopia has built it without foreign support. However, China is reportedly pumping million of dollars into the dam scheme.
Ethiopia is to generate 45 per cent of its energy from the Nile Basin, a plan that does not sit well with Cairo.
Ethiopia has also built multiple hydro dam along the Gibe 3 the largest in Sub-Saharan Africa despite growing protest from environmental groups over its impact on a half a million people in Northern Kenya, as fear mount that it would cause Lake Turkana in the region to dry up.
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