INTERNATIONAL COURT OF JUSTICE AND ADMINISTRATION OF CONFLICT RESOLUTION
chapter two
International conflict dynamics and resolution: A conceptual framework
In this section, the nature of international conflicts, their dynamics, and oil as engine and fuel for conflict situations are discussed. The dispute settlement linkages between Cameroon and Nigeria are then established.
2.1 Nature of international conflicts
Conflict is as old as the history of mankind and therefore normal, natural and unavoidable, yet it can generate negative and very destructive impacts, as well as awareness, economic growth and development (Ivorgba 2005). What matters is our response to conflict and post-conflict situations. Conflict is an indication that somehow, there is misunderstanding that requires attention and proper action.
International conflicts might occur between governments striving to monopolise the exploitation of resources in disputed territories. It could arise when a nation-state intervenes in the domestic disputes of another state. Occasionally, a conflict may ensue where the nationals of one state are attacked, dehumanised, killed or maimed by the agents of another state. Conflicts between countries are often presented as occurring between their governments and such situations are either conducted or perceived as inter-governmental struggles, while the bone of contention is usually territory or some other economic resource (Asobie 2003). It is seldom the welfare of the ordinary citizens of the states concerned that provokes conflict situations in Africa. Even when such reasons are brandished, they often turn out to be attempts at concealing other agendas.
As noted by Asobie (2003), a deeper examination may reveal that, in essence, international conflicts are struggles between primary social classes, clashing across national boundaries. In this regard, the real actors in international conflicts are social classes (for instance, the ruling elite) which, in their struggles, mobilise and use the various state institutions to push forward their goals. For the most part, contests are related to the control of productive resources. Even when such resources are exploited, the proceeds are typically distributed disproportionately in favour of the ruling classes and their cronies/protégés. As the working class citizens become aware of this unequal sharing, the more vulnerable ones may be attracted into social movements conceived and sponsored by disgruntled drop- outs from the ruling class. Such social movements are fashioned to operate in opposition to the ruling elite using all sorts of means, while expecting better days ahead.
Hiding behind governments, in some international conflicts, are the monopolistic capitalists operating trans-nationally with multinational tentacles. Major oil and mineral exploiting companies belong to this category. These dominant expatriate capitalists are typically in simultaneous alliances with the respective ruling classes in the exploitation of resources in both countries. These unpleasant alliances often manifest in millions of hard currency diverted and stacked away in foreign banks, and open avenues for interventions in domestic affairs of host countries that serve the interest of multinationals even at the cost of inter-state conflicts. Yet victims of such conflicts remain the working people
– especially the youth, women and child soldiers, as well as old people who find it difficult to escape conflict zones, emigrate or seek refugee status elsewhere.
2.2 Dynamics of international conflicts
The dynamics of most international conflicts may be shaped by three critical factors:
(1) The nature and size of the booty that would accrue from the conflict. This refers to the relative utility and size of the presumed productive resources that the victor might gain after the struggle.
(2) The nature of the relationship between the social classes that constitute the primary actors in conflict. Once monopolistic capitalists either on one side or on
both sides of the state territorial boundaries have high stakes in the outcome of the conflict, the spiral of international conflicts will be almost unending.3
(3) The nature of domestic politics in the nation-states that form the bases for the contending parties. This includes the nature of the regime in power. Authoritarian/dictatorial regimes have the tendency to provoke the emergence of violent inter-state politics, so as to divert attention from burning domestic issues and prolong their stay in power.
Generally, when violent conflicts erupt between two contending ruling classes of two distinct countries, they are extensions of violent intra-state conflicts promoted by the various discontented social groups who may be having international connections. Hoffmann (1985) observed that one definitely cannot imagine a non-violent diplomacy as long as violence has not been eliminated from intra-state politics. In this connection, social movements within territorial boundaries frequently seek to establish links with similar bodies in neighbouring countries and will spare no effort in taking advantage of a conflict situation to canvass for international recognition.
2.3 Oil as engine and fuel for conflict situations
It is possible that in some cases conflicts originated before the discovery of petroleum, but became interwoven with oil issues as the importance of oil as a factor of production increased. The drivers of such tendencies are territorial disputes, separatist struggles and factional/dynastic struggles.
Territorial disputes occur in border zones and offshore areas that were thought to possess no particular value, but suddenly become very valuable with the discovery of oil. For several decades, neither the Nigerian nor Cameroonian ruling elite showed any particular interest in the Bakassi Peninsula. Neither showed any concern nor initiated any programme that was capable of ameliorating the deplorable conditions of mass poverty, squalor and destitution in which most Bakassi residents live. But struggles over the ownership of Bakassi by Nigeria and Cameroon began immediately it was discovered in the eighties that the Peninsula was floating on reserves of crude oil (Sango 2002). It was only then that the elite of both countries started making serious claims and counter- claims over the territory.4
Separatist struggles occur when oil is produced or presumed to exist in an area largely inhabited by an ethnic minority and the bulk of oil revenues go or are expected to go to government officials in the national capital. In this context, members of the ethnic minority often perceive a strong incentive to break away and establish their own ethnic state, with a view to getting all of the oil revenue. This sort of struggle is occurring in the southern part of Sudan, where the predominantly Christian population is struggling for independence and in Cameroon, where the Southern Cameroon National Council (SCNC) sympathises with advocates for the independence of the Bakassi Peninsula as ‘The Republic of Ambazonia’ (Gumne 2006). In some cases such as the Delta region of Nigeria, ethnic minorities are fighting to gain greater autonomy (and a larger share of oil revenues) rather than a separate state.
Factional/dynastic struggles occur because whoever controls the government of oil-producing states also controls the allocation of oil revenues. Those in control will seek to retain power for as long as possible, using heavy-handed repression and election rigging, while those excluded from power will have a powerful incentive to use any means necessary to gain control (including armed rebellion, terrorism, or coup d’état). These sorts of factional struggles have been a consistent pattern in countries like Nigeria and Saudi Arabia, as well as in most oil-rich states. In other countries, especially Venezuela, disputes over the allocation of oil revenues have taken the form of political violence between competing parties and interest groups (Klare 2004).
2.4 Dispute settlement linkages between Cameroon and Nigeria
The conflict between Nigeria and Cameroon was a boundary and territorial dispute – the Bakassi Peninsula being the most contested. Attempts were made in the past to resolve the dispute through bilateral negotiations, but in 1981, and again in 1993, 1994 and 1996, the dispute nearly escalated to a war. Between 1994 and 2002, the matter was before the International Court of Justice at The Hague. A judgment was pronounced in 2002 by the ICJ on the matter and the Nigerian government issued a statement rejecting the verdict of the International Court. Yet following negotiations between the two countries, facilitated by the UN and crowned by the June 2006 Green-tree Agreement in New York and subsequent instruments, Nigeria completed the withdrawal of its military, administration and police from the Bakassi Peninsula in August 2008. This has been described as a remarkable outcome in conflict resolution in Africa. However, it will be naïve to conclude that the issue has been neatly resolved without a careful examination of the linkages propelling the conflict and resolution processes.
Geopolitics of the Bakassi dispute
The colonial legacy
Before the scramble for Africa, Bakassi was part of the ancient kingdom of Calabar. The people in the main settlements in the Bakassi Peninsula owed allegiance to the Obong of Calabar. The Obong of Calabar placed not only Calabar, but also the Efike and Ibibio (in the Peninsula) under the status of a British protectorate via a Treaty on 10 September 1884. The chiefs of Efike and Ibibio were co-signatories to the Treaty. Subsequently, through a series of bilateral treaties and other legal instruments, the territory was ceded by the
British in 1913, first to Germany, and later placed under the mandate of the League of Nations and the Trusteeship of the United Nations in 1919 at the end of the First World War. Finally, it was ceded by plebiscite to independent Cameroon in 1961.
The critical legal instruments that changed the status of the Peninsula and its inhabitants were the following (Aghemelo and Ibhasebhor 2006; Omoigui 2006):
•The agreement between the United Kingdom and Germany signed in London on 11 March 1913 entitled ‘(1) the Settlement of the Frontier between Nigeria and the Cameroons, from Yola to the sea, and (2) the Regulation of Navigation on the Cross River’.
• The Anglo-German Protocol signed in Obokun on 12 April 1913, demarcating the Anglo-German boundary between Nigeria and Kamerun5 from Yola to the Cross River. Eight maps accompanied this Protocol.
• The exchange of letters between the British and German governments on 6 July 1914.
• The endorsement, in April 1961, by both the United Nations General Assembly and the International Court of Justice, of the results of the plebiscites conducted in Northern and Southern Cameroons in 1959 and on 11 February 1961, respectively.
• The Diplomatic Note, accompanied by a map, dispatched to the government of Cameroon by Nigeria in 1962, accepting the results of the plebiscites.
For the Bakassi Peninsula in particular, the Germans were interested in getting assurance that Britain would not seek to expand eastwards. The British were interested in uninterrupted and secure sea route access to Calabar, a key trading port. Since the Germans already had the option of using the Douala port, they conceded the ‘navigable portion’ of the offshore border to Britain. In exchange, Britain conceded the Bakassi Peninsula proper to Germany.6 Note that ‘Nigeria’ did not yet exist as an independent state in 1913.
In January 1914, ‘Nigeria’ was created by amalgamation of the various British protectorates spanning the north to the south. At the end of the First World War, all German territories were divided between France and Britain by the Treaty of Versailles. The League of Nations placed them under French or British mandate. The boundaries between British and French mandated Kamerun were defined by the Franco-British Declaration of 10 July 1919. In this agreement, Bakassi and the rest of what became known as ‘British Cameroons’ were placed under British mandate and administered coterminous with ‘Nigeria’ but not merged. The old 1913 border was retained. To codify this further, other agreements were signed on 29 December 1929 and 11 January 1930 between Britain and France. These declarations were ratified and incorporated in an Exchange of Notes on 9 January 1931 between the French Ambassador in London and the British Foreign Minister. Again, maps from that period show the Bakassi Peninsula within ‘British Cameroons’ (Omoigui 2006).
The advent of independence
On 1 January 1960 and on 1 October 1960, the French Cameroun and Nigeria became independent, respectively. Instruments creating thenew countries and exchange of notes between France and Cameroun rehashed all its colonial boundaries as defined by previous colonial agreements. A plebiscite was held to ‘clarify the wishes of the people living in Northern and Southern Cameroons under British rule’. The population of Northern Cameroons still under British rule had earlier – in 1959 – ‘decided to achieve independence by joining the independent Federation of Nigeria’. The population of Southern Cameroons ‘decided toachieve independence byjoining the independentRepublic of Cameroun’ on 11 February 1961 (United Nations 1961). There were 21 polling stations on the Bakassi Peninsula itself and about 73% of the people living there voted to ‘achieve independence by joining the independent Republic of Cameroun’ (Omoigui 2006).
Moreover, by Diplomatic Note No. 570 of 27 March 1962, the government of Tafawa Balewa of Nigeria exchanged diplomatic notes with Cameroon acknowledging the fact that Bakassi was indeed Cameroonian territory (Aghemelo and Ibhasebhor 2006). In July 1966, Lt.-Col. Gowon came to power in Nigeria. As the Balewa government, he too committed his government to respect all prior international agreements made by the Balewa and Ironsi governments.
Political developments and the Bakassi question
In May 1967, in response to the mandate granted to Lt.-Col. Ojukwu by the self- imposed Eastern Consultative Assembly to secede, Lt.-Col. Gowon created 12 new states in Nigeria – including the South-Eastern State headed by an Ibibio officer. The creation of the South-Eastern State from the former Eastern Region rekindled interest in rejoining Nigeria among Efike and Ibibio residents of the Bakassi Peninsula – many of whom had actually voted in 1961 not to pursue integration with Nigeria. In July 1967, the Nigerian Civil War broke out and lasted until January 1970.
In April 1971, there was a summit meeting between General Gowon of Nigeria and Alhaji Ahmadou Ahidjo of Cameroon in Yaoundé. It was at this meeting that Gowon and Ahidjo agreed to define the navigable channel of the Akpa- Yafe River up to Point 12. During the summit, Ahidjo asked his survey expert to stop arguing and asked Gowon to draw the line where he wanted it, and Gowon turned to his own technical expert for guidance. The expert marked a point on the map and Gowon drew the line towards that point (Omoigui 2006). Unfortunately, the line Gowon drew – on direct advice from the Director of Federal Surveys – was not the true navigable channel of the Akpa-Yafe River as established by the colonial masters.
Two months later, in June 1971, the Joint Boundary Commission met in Lagos, led by Chief Coker for Nigeria and Mr Ngo for Cameroon. They extended the already faulty Gowon-Ahidjo ‘compromise line’ outwards to the sea in what became known as the Coker-Ngo line. A few weeks later, following the signing of the Coker-Ngo line, Gowon discovered what had transpired. In May 1972, the joint boundary commission met, followed in August 1972 by a summit meeting at Garoua, where General Gowon tried repeatedly without success to get Ahidjo to agree to the reversal and renegotiation of the Gowon-Ahidjo/Coker-Ngo line. An oil rig was erected offshore by the Ahidjo government in 1974, and later in June 1975 in a highly reluctant compromise to accommodate the rig, Gowon conceded a tiny part of Nigerian maritime territory to Cameroon.
On 29 July 1975, General Gowon was overthrown in a coup d’état. The new regime decided to question the 1971 and 1975 Gowon-Ahidjo maritime agreements – either without really understanding the issues or by acting mischievously. In no time the country got the impression that Gowon had given away the ‘Bakassi Peninsula’ to Cameroon to compensate for President Ahidjo’s neutrality during the Nigerian Civil War, an unfortunate and totally false notion which persists in many quarters to this day (Omoigui 2006; Olumide 2002). Many commentators still do not realise that the Peninsula had been ceded by a series of actions and inactions beginning as far back as 1913, reconfirmed when Nigeria became independent in 1960, finalised with the 1961 plebiscite and affirmed with the 1964 Organisation of African Unity (OAU) declaration, which stipulated that independent African countries were bound to respect their colonial borders (Omoigui 2006).