"The topography "and the climatic conditions present an unprecedented
challenges in the demarcation process", said a member of the UN team. The
project was "longer than the sum of the UN-led demarcation projects between
Ethiopia and Eritrea, Indonesia and East Timor, and Iraq and Kuwait", he
said"
http://www.theguardian.com/global-development/2014/feb/16/cameroon-nigeria-border-settlement-development-challenges
Cameroon-Nigeria border settlement faces tough development challenges
Despite progress in a difficult demarcation process, the Bakassi region
faces an uphill struggle with basic services and security
Twelve years after an international court of justice (ICJ) ruling
demarcated the Cameroon-Nigeria border, the UN and the governments of both
countries are making headway in physically laying down the border and
helping develop the long-marginalised oil-rich Bakassi region. But while
many positive lessons can be drawn from the Nigeria-Cameroon demarcation
process, when it comes to development, there remains much work to do,
according to Bakassi residents.
The Cameroon and Nigeria governments have overcome tense periods of
negotiation over control of Bakassi, in the Gulf of Guinea, and the Lake
Chad area further north, both of which were assigned by the ruling to
Cameroon. With the help of mediators, trust between the two countries has
gradually improved, paving the way for joint security and economic ventures
in support of Bakassi's fishing and oil industries.
Since 2011, technical and logistics teams have travelled from Senegal's
capital, Dakar, to lay down the concrete pillars that form the
Cameroon-Nigeria border. The UN support team to the Cameroon-Nigeria Mixed
Commission (CNMC), which is charged with physically demarcating the land
and sea boundaries, is based in Dakar. The job poses enormous physical,
logistical and legal challenges. The border spans 2,100km across mountains
and desert in the north, dense forests in the south, and 21 border points
in the ocean.
The topography "and the climatic conditions present an unprecedented
challenges in the demarcation process", said a member of the UN team. The
project was "longer than the sum of the UN-led demarcation projects between
Ethiopia and Eritrea, Indonesia and East Timor, and Iraq and Kuwait", he
said.
The concrete primary and secondary pillars - placed every 5km and every 500
metres respectively - are cast on site, but getting the materials to areas
inaccessible by road is a hurdle, said team members.
Steps involved in setting up a pillar include mapping the co-ordinates;
preparing and excavating the site; constructing the pillar; curing the
concrete and verifying it, said the project manager of the UN support team
to the CNMC in Dakar.
Some mountainous areas, such as the Alantika Mountains, are inaccessible to
boundary-markers; cartographers have mapped these locations digitally,
using global positioning system co-ordinates and a "digital elevation
model", a programme that enables accuracy within 1cm.
Complicating this process is insecurity in many of the target areas:
Bakassi is on the Gulf of Guinea, where piracy is rife, on the Nigerian
side Boko Haram and its affiliate militant groups engage in kidnapping and
other violence , and there are "acts of banditry all over," said the UN
head in Cameroon, Najat Rochdi.
Still, the largely peaceful resolution of the border dispute - which at one
point led to outright conflict - should act as a model for other boundary
discussions ongoing elsewhere in Africa, said an official with the African
Union. Just 30% of Africa's borders are precisely demarcated, he added,
with ongoing discussions continuing all over the continent, from Burkina
Faso to Sudan.
While still insecure, the border area is now heavily patrolled, with
military factions from both governments on either side. UN observers are
also in place to monitor people's protection and basic rights.
But some suspicions linger, said an officer with Cameroon's rapid
intervention battalion, stationed in Akwa, near the Nigeria border.
"We are there to protect both the land and people, but many locals do not
understand this. Whenever we, the military, pass, some run into the bushes.
I think they still think we are there for war with Nigeria," he said.
He said that in 2013, nine soldiers and many local traders were killed in
trans-border crime incidents.
Development challenge
Perhaps the biggest challenge for the Cameroonian and Nigerian authorities
will be developing the long-marginalised Bakassi region, particularly
supporting the area's fishing industry, the economy's mainstay, while under
pressure to build up the lucrative but environmentally hazardous oil
industry. Shoring up fishing is key to the region's long-term growth, said
officials.
Bakassi remains seriously underdeveloped. Residents have no mobile
communication network, no electricity, and few have access to clean water.
Paradoxically, many residents of oil-rich Bakassi buy oil from nearby
Limbe, where refined oil is more readily available.
"The absence of basic necessities such as water, electricity and
communication facilities makes life there very difficult," said Hilary
Ndip, a secondary school teacher who left Bakassi for Limbe because of his
health situation.
Nigeria is Cameroon's biggest economic partner in sub-Saharan Africa, after
the Economic and Financial Affairs Council of the European Union. The two
governments are building cross-border roads to try to support the fishing
trade, and they have drawn up an agreement for joint management of oil
resources in the Bakassi area.
"The most important thing now is to make people understand that the border
is not a barrier but a bridge between them," a former UN observer based in
Yaoundé said.
The governments, along with UN country teams, have developed several
projects aimed at supporting cross-border inter-community relations,
cementing social cohesion, cutting poverty and improving basic services.
Several of these projects are now underway, including a measles vaccination
campaign, community radio programme and project to build a refrigerated
storage room for traders. But not all of the programmes have received
financing, and progress has been slow.
And though the government is increasingly its role, people will need time
to adjust, said a 37-year-old trader who called himself Oyang. "Bakassi
villagers ... have never witnessed the role of public authorities ... We have
only known traditional chiefs, but today that is changing," he said.
The Cameroon government has made education free, and in Ija-Bato 2, the
area's municipal headquarters, it has equipped teaching hospitals to
provide services for free, said Ndip, though "very few people use them".
He says that while primary school enrolment rates are up, "no one cares
about schooling ... Early every morning, kids as young as five go out in
canoes fishing with their parents. Very few people attend the hospitals ...
Most of them do not use the mosquito nets that are given to them. They
prefer to use them for fishing."
Some Bakassi residents do not access basic services because they lack
identity papers, said Martin Edang, a trader and resident of Ija-Bato 1.
According to the UN's Rochdi, some people in northern Nigeria living in
areas ceded to Cameroon have still not received identity cards or documents
allowing them to stay there legally.
Cameroon has informed residents that they can get their papers free of
charge, Bakassi residents said. It is more a question of choice, said
Edang. "Many are still not willing to visit public offices ... Many are still
confused over which country they want to belong to."
Received on Sat Feb 22 2014 - 23:30:09 EST