Civil Wars in Africa
Introduction
Wars are experienced in the smallest unit of human life, which is the family set-up. People argue and fight from as low as the household level and for various reasons. The reason could vary from minor domestic issues such as minor disagreement between husband and wife, parents and their children, and siblings against one another. The minor arguments could escalate to major issues such as land inheritance and the resulting wars lead to disasters such as death and disability. From the family unit, wars extend to clans and villages, and finally, tribes start turning against each other. A country can also experience war when different groups of its citizens go to war. The resulting war is known as a civil war. According to Merriam-Webster (2017), a civil war is that which occurs between groups opposing one another and they are coming from the same country. Rebellion/ war can be caused by many factors ranging from minor to major factors. Some of these factors include; inequality, ethnic divisions, religious divisions, insufficient political rights, and economic variables; all of which could be wholly classified as grievances (Cramer, 2003). People rebel when their grievances are sufficient enough to allow for engagement in violent protest. People could also go to war with other groups as a result of greed, in the sense that they may be looking to acquire or maintain possession of a given property. Many wars in African countries can be classified as civil wars and the aim of this essay is to find out if greed is the major cause for these wars. The essay also seeks to identify whether the wars could be as a result of grievances.
Causes of Civil Wars
As seen earlier, rebellion is a result of greed or grievances. Civil wars can also be caused by economic variables. According to Grossman (1991,1999), there is an economic theory that models civil war as a profit-generating industry, such that insurgents cannot be distinguished from bandits or rioters (Collier and Hoeffler, 2004). The latter statement means that while civil war can be dangerous, to others it becomes a profit-making business. On one part, the above can be described as greed, and on the other part, it becomes an economic variable. The rebelling group is driven by greed and the people are well aware that there are profits to be gained during the rebellion (Collier and Hoeffler, 2001). According to economists, rebellion is mainly a result of greed with the urge to gain profits and not as a result of grievances.
The causes of civil wars are broadly classified into three broad classes. According to Hirshleifer (1995, 2001), the three classes include ‘preferences, opportunities, and perceptions’ (Collier and Hoeffler, 2004, pg. 2). On perception, Hirshleifer argues that opportunities and grievances are in most cases misperceived; if thought opportunity for war is illusory, profits are not experienced and this causes collapse (Collier and Hoeffler, 2004). Hirshleifer also explains that exaggerated grievances may lead to rebellion and eventually the grievances may end up being genuine.
Some societies go to war as a result of grievances that are not viable; misperceptions. Some groups also have exaggerated grievances that trigger war. In some of the cases as the ones mentioned above, motive cannot be said to be the cause for war. In earlier cases, the motive for war has been seen as profit gains but in the later case, rebellion is as a result of misperceived agendas (Collier and Hoeffler, 2004). Societies go to war with each other due to reasons that if placed on the table, they initially could not have led into war. These reasons can be classified as both greed-oriented and misconceptions. Other societies will also go to war over grievances that are way too exaggerated; those that could have been solved through dialogue.
Different authors define civil war in different ways. According to Collier and Hoeffler (2004), civil war qualifies as an internal conflict that accounts for at least 1,000 war-related deaths every year. For the civil war to be distinguished from massacres, two parties that is the government forces and the rebel organization must experience 5% of the 1,000 fatalities (Collier and Hoeffler, 2004). At this point, the essay looks into the issue of opportunity which was mentioned earlier as a cause of civil wars. When rebels are funded, they get the opportunity to go to war with other citizens. The funding comes from three major sources; ‘extortion of natural resources, donations from diasporas and subventions from hostile governments’ (Collier and Hoeffler, 2004, pg. 3). Africa is one of the continents that have been faced with civil wars as a result of circumstances such as extortion of natural resources (Fearon, 2005). A good example is West Africa where the natural resource is diamond (Collier and Hoeffler, 2004). Other parts of the world are also faced with the same crisis such as Cambodia whose natural resource is timber and Colombia whose natural resource is cocaine (Collier and Hoeffler, 2001). Both countries have faced civil wars due to the opportunities provided by the natural resources.
Greed is a major cause of rebellion which leads to civil wars. The rebel organizations which are greed oriented have around 500 to 5,000 rebels and the number can go up to 60,000 employees, such as UNITA which is an Angolan-based rebel organization (Collier and Hoeffler, 2002). The rebels are usually untrained people and they are provided with guns. However, the organizations require a lot of money and it is at this point that the financiers mentioned earlier come in. Greed leads hostile governments to fund the rebel organization which in return engage in civil wars. Finances are also raised through extortion of commodities of export, an act which is mainly greed-oriented (Fearon, 2005). Some of the countries that have been faced with civil war as a result of greed include Angola and Sierra Leone, both of which are African nations. The commodity of extortion in Sierra Leone is diamond and it’s the same commodity extorted by rebels in Angola (Collier and Hoeffler, 2002). Greed as a cause of rebellion can well be seen to happen in countries where the commodity of extortion is of high value. In that, the rebelling organization is set to gain profits from such a commodity. The rebel organizations mainly target the production process or the transport sector of the commodities they are aiming to extort and, in most cases, it happens in rural areas (Collier and Hoeffler, 2002).
When it comes to finances from diasporas, a good example is the financing of Tamil Tigers by Tamils living in North America (Collier and Hoeffler, 2004). Hostile governments have also been observed to be sources of financial help to rebels. This help goes beyond national boundaries, in that foreign governments fund rebellion groups in a given country. However, such a situation could qualify as a Cold War. An example of hostile government funding is that of the Renamo rebellion which is in Mozambique getting funded by the South Rhodesian government (Collier and Hoeffler, 2004).
Grievances are a major cause of conflicts. According to Collier and Hoeffler (2004), ethnic and religious rivalries are the major grievances that are said to cause civil wars. Civil wars caused by ethnic and religious rivalries mainly occur in areas of multi-ethnicity and religious diversification. If a certain area has many different ethnic groups, then civil wars are likely to occur in high numbers and the same case applies to areas dominated by many religions. Arguments such as land ownership, leadership, resource allocation, and many others will rise in the areas mentioned above, thus leading to civil wars.
Civil wars have indeed taken place around the world. According to Fearon and Laitin (2003), 25 interstate wars occurred between 1945 and 1999, resulting in about 3.33 million war deaths with killings of at least 1,000 and 100 on each side. The wars involved 25 states. In the same period, civil wars were taking place and at least 1,000 human beings died. Civil wars led to a high number of refugees as compared to those from regions faced with interstate wars (Fearon and Laitin, 2003). Civil wars lead to many undesirable consequences such as economic impairments and displacement. Afghanistan, Somalia, and Lebanon are among the countries that have experienced economic devastation as a result of civil wars (Fearon and Laitin, 2003).
As opposed to other authors, Fearon and Laitin argue that ethnic, religious, and cultural diversities cannot be solely responsible for civil wars (2003). They also differ from the argument that one can predict the occurrence of a civil war while basing their predictions on the weight of ethnic or political grievances (Fearon and Laitin, 2003). To the two authors, civil wars are a result of insurgency, a term they describe as a ‘technology of military conflict characterized by small, lightly armed bands practicing guerrilla warfare from rural base areas’ (Fearon and Laitin, 2003, pg. 75).
Civil Wars in Sudan
The wars in Sudan led to the violation of human rights by the security forces of Sudan, government-allied militants, and armed rebel organizations (Amnesty International, 2000). The acts mentioned above are a result of the major export commodity found in Sudan which is oil. Foreign companies that carry out oil operations in Sudan are a major source of civil wars and human rights violations (Amnesty International, 2000). This act can be seen as greed-oriented as different organizations inclusive of rebels compete to take possession of the oil fields in Sudan. According to Maina Kiai, who is the African Director of Amnesty International, the citizens living in oil fields and the neighboring areas have repeatedly been targeted and their rights abused while others have been forcibly displaced (Amnesty International, 2000). Some of the civilians received beatings, others were killed while the rest, such as women and girls were raped and abducted (Amnesty International, 2000).
Cases of greed were witnessed in Sudan whereby instead of the government protecting its people, it is busy guarding the oil fields (Amnesty International, 2000). Troops allied to the government also abused human rights in the name of protecting the oil fields. Here, the two parties can be observed to be driven by greed as they battle with other organizations that are aiming to acquire the oil fields (Collier and Sambanis, 2005). The foreign companies involved in the oil business have also turned a blind eye to the inhuman treatment in Sudan (Amnesty International, 2000). The latter can be described as an act of greed in that if the companies were to interfere with such a situation, they would lose the business. These companies are more interested in the profits than in the plight of the suffering civilians.
According to Christian Aid (2001), civilians in Sudan were being killed and raped as they were caught in the oil civil war that happened between Northern and Southern Sudan. The civil war over the oil fields has been going on for decades and many civilians have since perished. The Sudanese government was led by greed in their pursuit of a ‘scorched earth’, whereby the aim was to clear the civilians from the land, thus making way for the ‘exploration and exploitation of oil’ by companies from foreign nations (Christian Aid, 2001, np). Organizations that were neither allied to the government nor to foreign companies also rebelled due to the pressure mounted on the civilians and the result was civil war. In this issue of oil in Sudan, the war is seen to have been caused by greed (Collier and Sambanis, 2005). The government was too greedy for the profits from the oil such that they abandoned and even killed her citizens.
The construction of the pipeline which headed to the Red Sea started in 1998 and hundreds of thousands of civilians were forced to leave their homes, mostly those in the upper Nile (Christian Aid, 2001). Their homes, livestock, and other property were completely burnt by the government and its troops in a bid to ensure that no one returned to that place (Christian Aid, 2001). All these are acts of greed by the government. If the government was not acting our of greed, they would peacefully move the citizens into other areas and even offer them compensation. However, that was not the case, the citizens were forcibly evicted. The case in Sudan cannot also be described as one resulting from grievances as the victims are not in a position to retaliate and fight with the government (Collier and Sambanis, 2005). The war in Sudan was not only ethnically or religiously drawn; it was one involving the government against its people.
Civil wars in Nigeria
The Nigerian Civil War ran from 1966 to 1970. The war was heartless and both sides suffered with the country being left in ruins (Tabb, 2014). Many people including civilians and soldiers died as they both tried to liberate their sides. The war began after eastern Nigeria split from the republic to form the Republic of Biafra (Tabb, 2014). The latter complained that the government was oppressing them, thus this part of the war was a result of grievances.
Nigeria gained independence in 1960 and at that time, it was made up of more than 250 ethnic groups (Ekwe, nd). The inhabitants of North Nigeria were mostly Muslims from the Hausa tribe; the south-west of the country was inhabited by half-Muslim and half-Christian Yoruba tribes, and in the south-east of Nigeria lived the Christian Igbo (Ekwe, nd). Just like in Sudan, Nigeria also had oil fields which partly led to the start of the civil wars. The oil fields were discovered in South-East of Nigeria which was inhabited by Igbo, in an area known as Oloibiri (Niger River Delta) (Ekwe, nd). The Igbo military led a coup that saw them rule Nigeria, one year after the oil was discovered (Ekwe, nd). The Igbo community had grievances that despite the fact that a large part of the oil fields were in their territory, the government was only giving them a small amount of the profits (Ekwe, nd). Acts of greed can be observed from the side of the government while the Igbo were driven to rebel in order for their grievances to be heard. In response to the coup, Muslims started killing Christians who were from the Igbo community (Ekwe, nd). The latter led to the sprouting of ethnic wars which bore fruit to civil wars (Ekwe, nd).
Nigeria suffered from several coups and counter-coups attacks in 1966 (Dudley, 1968). The result of the coups and the counter-coups was the civil war by Biafra which was a rebel organization (Bethke, nd). The government imposed a blockage that prevented the affected populations from getting food, medical supplies, and related relief forms (Bethke, nd). Many people died as a result of hunger, starvation, and also disease. However, the Nigerian government attacked Biafra, leading to the end of the Biafran resistance in 1970 (Bethke, nd).
The civil war in Nigeria was one fought out of necessity as the factors leading to the rebellion were politically structured (Oluda, 2011). However, the colonials were partly responsible for the war as they had brought about the amalgamation of various ethnic groups and they were ruled as different regions (Oluda, 2011). The pattern of rule applied by the colonials progressed on in Nigeria after independence and the country was divided, leading to civil war (Oluda, 2011). It was observed that political parties were purely based on ethnic/ tribal groups rather than on national interests. Greed is not so much pronounced in the case of Nigeria but still, it plays a significant role in causing civil wars. However, it can be noted that different tribes got into war with one another in the quest to rule the country; a show of greed. After independence, ‘the battle to consolidate political and military power and dominance by one section of the country became very intense among the ethnic groups’; leading to a coup in January 1966 (Oluda, 2011, np). A counter-coup followed shortly after and then civil war. The fight for political dominance by different ethnic groups is greed-oriented. According to Oluda (2011), the civil wars in Nigeria led to the death of about 1 million citizens and many others became refugees. The country’s infrastructure was also immensely destroyed. The Eastern Nigeria felt the highest effect of the war as they tried to fight off Biafra (Dudley, 1968).
Conclusion
People fight one another for various reasons and with the aim of achieving a given goal. Fights can involve as less people as two in number and they can go up to nations against nations. As seen in the essay, some of the reasons that lead to wars and fights can be resolved without necessarily having to get physically involved, while others are almost irresolvable without a physical battle. People get into arguments along tribal, ethnic, and religious lines; whereas others fight along national boundaries. There are cases whereby citizens of a given country fight against each other and in this same scenario, the government may get involved. The latter case can be described as the Civil Wars. Civil wars are a result of greed and grievances. The grievances range from political oppression, inequality, economic variables, and ethnic and religious divisions among others. People are also involved in civil war due to preferences, opportunities, and perceptions. The major cause of civil in Africa can be seen to be greed. Governments have been observed to kill and displace their citizens for the love of money. Sudan and Nigeria are good examples whereby the well-being of the citizens has been compromised for the sake of oil. The rebel organizations in the countries faced with civil wars receive funding from various avenues. Some of these avenues include diasporas, foreign hostile governments, and extortion of export commodities. Greed can be seen as the major cause of civil wars in most African countries and in other parts of the world such as Cambodia.
References
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