It is pretty much common cause among strategic analysts that the next world war will be fought over water .

The argument that oil might be the casus belli has been dealt a body blow by the Covid 19 lockdown.

The black stuff remains vital to economic prosperity – important enough, certainly to take up arms over it.

But in the last three months as the economy was forced to take a backseat to public health, the price of oil dropped below zero.

And through the worst times since the Second World War,  the clear stuff has remained as vital to life itself as ever it did.

The most dramatic example of this is the battle over the water in Africa’s longest river stretch 6650 kms from south to .

President Cyril Ramaphosa, in his capacity as revolving chairman of the African Union, presided over a virtual summit yesterday seeking agreement on the use of  the Nile.

The three parties in the thick of things – Ethiopia, Sudan and Egypt – agreed to continue pursuing an accord.

That is obviously better than having any of them walk off in a huff.

But they are still a considerable distance from finding an African solution to this existential African problem.

We may take comfort from Egypt asserting that it will not go to war over the Nile.

But since President Abdel Fattah El Sisi has involved both the United Nations Security Council and the Arab, in addition to the African Union, in this imbroglio we may be assured the matter will not go away for some time.

El Sisi would have us believe that the problem started when Ethiopia broke ground nine years ago on the Great Ethiopian Renaissance Dam (GERD) across the Blue Nile.

The six-billion-dollar wall rising 155-metres above the water below and extending 1,85 kms across the valley  will make Ethiopia Africa’s largest producer of hydro electric energy and lift many of that country’s 106-million people out of poverty.

Downstream, Egypt counters that the dam will reduce the supply of water on which 100-million of its people are entirely reliant for their survival.

The third riparian country at the top end of the giant river is Sudan, where the White and Blue Niles meet in its capital Khartoum.

It too complains that the GERD will reduce its supply of Nile water. But its position is convoluted by the fact that it will buy some of the 6500 mw generated at the GERD and that the dam will reduce the flood damage it suffers annually from the Nile.

Egypt’s historical hegemony over the Nile was underpinned by agreements signed in 1929 and 1959 by the colonial power, Britain.

Ethiopia was not party to those agreements that it maintain are part of an unhappy past.

It has sought a new agreement with all eleven riparian countries – Burundi, Rwanda, Tanzania, Uganda, Kenya, the Democratic Republic of Congo, South Sudan, and Eritrea in addition to the northern troika.

This has proved problematic because it requires more than a technical accord on water sharing.

It runs to legal, historical and trust issues that have brought the United States and Europe into the equation.

The matter has come to a head now because satellite pictures show Ethiopia is carrying out its plan to start filling the dam.

Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed, who won the Nobel Peace Prize last year for the compromise he showed in forging a peace with neighboring Eritrea, has been stubborn on this issue. He refuses to tell Egypt how much water will be allowed to flow downstream from the GERD.

Egypt wants this and more, nothing less than an agreement on how much water it can rely on in times of drought and an agreement on the very definition of a drought.

There is also divergence over the timing of the filling.

Ethiopia says it could complete this process in three years but offers a compromise of taking four to seven years. 

Egypt maintains the faster this happens, the greater the impact on its farmers downstream. It is asking for Ethiopia to take at least 21years to fill the dam.

However forceful the ministers of Ahmed and El Sisi may sound in negotiations, their positions must be seen against the domestic troubles in both Ethiopia, which has had to postpone for a year elections scheduled for August and Egypt which has had to commit its full military capability to fighting insurgents in the Sinai.

El Sisi’s claim to be fighting for the very existence of his people must be measured against the real beneficiaries of the Nile water – the factory owner and big farmers who are all part of the power elite that keep him where he is.

Ahmed, for his part, cannot back down on a project financed by loans and donations from a public that still vividly remembers the civil war and famine that turned it into a basket case.

The GERD is an integral part in Ethiopia continuing on its upward trajectory.

ends

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Three more African countries has recorded confirmed cases of COVID 19.

These include Burundi where authorities admitted last week there were no cases recorded simply because they had not been testing.

Scientists assume that the five African countries that have not acknowledged cases of COVID 19 are doing this because, like Burundi, they have not been testing for it.

Somaliland and Sierra Leone have registered their first cases.

This morning there have been 6 383 cases of COVID 19 confirmed in Africa. 5 642 of these are still active.

505 of these patients are described  as recovered and 236 have died.

South Africa has the highest figures of the continent with five deaths from the 1325 active cases.

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The ruling party says Evariste Ndayishimiye will be the candidate to succeed Nkurunziza who has been at the helm for 15 years.

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Pierre Nkurunziza, who put down bloody protests when he unconstitutionally contested for a third presidential term, made the surprise announcement that he would stand again in elections next May.

The ruling CNDD FDD has conferred on him the title Paramount Leader and Champion of Democracy.

It is not clear exactly what his powers and responsibilities will be….

….and how this will impact on the presidency of Evariste Ndayishimiye, a close ally and secretary general of the ruling party, who has been chosen to succeed him

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There have been two million cases of the mosquito borne disease in Burundi this year that have left 2700 people dead.

Back in August the United Nations was saying that malaria in Burundi has killed more people than the EBOLA outbreak in the Democratic Republic of Congo.

Burundi authorities contested the figures and denied that it has reached epidemic proportions.

The government has yet to respond to the latest figures from the UN that list 1,5 million cases of malaria in the past two months.

Many of the 11-million Burundians have sought refuge in Rwanda where there has been considerable success in preventing cases and treating the  disease.

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A SADC assessment team found Burundi President Pierre Nkurunziza’s decision to contest an unconstitutional extra term in power four years ago created unacceptable international security problem.

President Pierre Nkurunziza was not expecting this humiliating rejection when he sent a special envoy to SADC’s current head, Namibian President Hage Geingob, last month seeking Burundi’s admission.

Geingob has told his Tanzanian counterpart John Magufuli, who visited Namibia this week,  that the SADC assessment team that was  speedily despatched has given the application the thumbs down.

The rejection will grist be to mills of Nkurunziza’s domestic rivals who risk everything opposing an increasingly oppressive regime

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The request has gone to Uganda’s President Yoweri Museveni who has to consider the regional security threat posed by calling such a meeting.

Burundi shunned an East Africa Community summit at the beginning of this month.

Now its calling for a meeting of regional leaders and stipulating its agenda.

President Pierre Nkurunziza blames his Rwandan counterpart Paul Kagame for his troubles since 2015 when he contested an unconstitutional third term in power.

He alleges Kagame is offering military training to Burundian refugees who left the country after an attempted coup that year.

Kagame, in turn, accuses Burundi of sheltering FDLR rebels responsible for the genocide in his country 24 years ago.

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It follows the world organization’s human rights chief Zeid Raad al Hussein calling that country the most prolific slaughterhouse of humans in recent times.

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Burundi authorities have given the UN human rights body two months to quit their capital.

A UNHRC report accuses the Burundi regime of involvement in systematic abuses and risk of genocide following President Pierre Nkurunziza’s  decision in 2015 to seek an unconstitutional third term in office.

The commission regrets the decision and says it would have preferred to continue its cooperation with Burundi.

Amnesty International says its deeply disappointed by the Burundi government action  but insists that truth will still get out of the country where thousands of the president’s opponents have been killed. 

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Burundian authorities have refused to comment on the report based on testimony of former government intelligence agents.

The government in Bujumbura has repeatedly denied any human rights violations.

It also discounted reports in 2016 on social media that blood was running from a  drain in house in the Burundi capital where critics of President Pierre Nkurunziza were tortured and killed.

BBC Africa Eye has spoken to a former occupant of the house who says it was take over by state intelligence operatives after he fled the country because he opposed the president’s seeking an unconstitutional third term in power.

The report also features accounts of people detained there who saw and heard people being killed and tortured.

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The African union has warned that the warrants against Mali-based Buyoya and 17 former Burundi officials could reignite ethnic conflict in that Great Lakes country.

With a regional summit looming on conflict in Burundi, President Pierre Nkurunziza is trying to deflect attention away from the problems caused by his power grab.

He’s arrested former military officials for alleged involvement in the 1993 assassination of President Melchior Ndadaye, four months after he became Burundi’s first democratically elected Hutu President.

Now he’s issued arrest warrants for former President Pierre Buyoya and 17 other officials.

The AU warns this could inflame ethnic tensions in a country where more than 300000 died in the civil war following Ndadaye’s murder.

Buyoya was instrumental in negotiating an end to that conflict.

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State Prosecutor Sylvestre Nyandwi says they’ve gathered substantial evidence against the four who will be brought to court as the investigation continues.

The killing of President Melchior Ndadaye sparked a 10-year civil war that cost more than 300 000 lives.

A United Nations report into the assassination was withheld for fear it would spark further ethnic violence.

Finally released in 1996, the report blamed the Tutsi-dominated military for killing Burundi’s first Hutu president.

President Pierre Nkurunziza, who came to power at the end of the civil war has increased tension in the country by extending his term at the helm beyond his constitutional mandate.

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