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IRIN-WA Update 372 of Events in West Africa (Monday January 4)
SIERRA LEONE: UNOMSIL considers redeploying
The United Nations Observer Mission in Sierra Leone (UNOMSIL) has sent a team to the eastern town of Kenema to assess the possibility of redeploying there, an official told IRIN today (Monday). The assessment follows growing ECOMOG battlefield superiority over the rebel Revolutionary United Front (RUF).
She said the team, which includes Chief Military Observer Brigadier General Subhash Joshi and Francis Okelo, the Special Representative of the UN Secretary-General, would also evaluate whether it was possible to return to the town of Bo where it also had observers. However, there were no immediate plans to redeploy to Makeni, she said.
UNOMSIL withdrew its observers from these towns when rebels attacked in December. Then, it relocated all non-essential staff to countries in the sub-region when rebels attacked towns close to Freetown, the Sierra Leonean capital.
ECOMOG mops up around Freetown
Diplomatic sources in Freetown told IRIN today the city remained calm and that ECOMOG was mopping up stragglers from the rebel force that attacked Waterloo in late December.
Hastings airport, in the city suburbs, is open to air traffic. Up country, the rebels received a severe mauling last week when they tried to seize Port Loko, 50 km northeast of Freetown, one diplomat and news reports said. A successful thrust would have opened the road to the country's only international airport at Lungi, across the bay form Freetown, news reports said.
The road between Freetown and Masiaka, a vital supply line for the capital, has reopened, according to truck drivers quoted by AFP.
The diplomat told IRIN that ECOMOG and local allied forces had also taken Masingbe, about 160 km northeast of Freetown. Although most of the public focus had been on the fighting near Freetown, he said, the main battles were in the east of the country where ECOMOG had managed to cut rebel supply lines. ECOMOG's spokesman could not be reached for comment.
Humanitarian situation
Newly Internally Displaced Persons (IDP) in the Sierra Leonean towns of Kambia, Kenema and Bo have enough food for one week, an official of the UN-Humanitarian Assistance Coordination Unit (HACU) told IRIN today.
There are 10,324 newly registered IDPs in Kambia who fled fighting in Makeni, Port Loko and from villages around Kambia. They are receiving help from UNICEF and WFP, the official said. She said that 6,906 IDPs had arrived in Kenema between 31 December 1998 and 2 January. A camp in the Kenema area run by the local Lebanese community held 1,114 IDPs from Kailahun, which lies some 80 km farther to the northeast. "All these people received rations for one week," she said. More IDPs were being registered from Kono District and the town of Tongo, 50 km north of Kenema, she said.
Most of the IDPs in Kenema are occupying classrooms so schools are still closed in the area, the official said.
Nigeria presses Security Council for urgent support for ECOWAS
Nigeria has asked the five permanent members of the UN Security Council to tighten the arms embargo on Liberia and the illegal arms supplies to Sierra Leonean RUF rebels, PANA reported on Thursday. Nigeria's ambassador to the United Nations, Ibrahim Gambari, who met the representatives of China, France, Russia, Britain and the US on 29 December, asked them to investigate countries accused of violating the arms embargo, including Liberia. Gambari also urged international support for the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS) which deployed intervention troops to support the legal government in Sierra Leone.
He called on the Council to get UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan to be more active in getting UN members to support Sierra Leone because previous appeals had gone largely unheeded.
Gambari also asked governments of the five permanent members to do more to support the peace effort. In a statement on 30 December, the US Department of State said that the US had given US $3.9 million to Sierra Leone in 1998. This year, it said, the US had allocated $1.3 million for logistics support to ECOMOG, the West African intervention force.
NIGERIA: Bayelsa crisis worsens
Up to 26 people were reported killed, 200 wounded and hundreds more displaced as a result of fighting between Ijaw youth and security forces in Bayelsa State, news agencies said. Military tanks, two warships and between 10,000-15,000 additional troops were deployed to the area in response to the crisis, sparked by Ijaw youths demanding greater control over local oil resources, news agencies said. Bayelsa State administrator Paul Obi declared a state of emergency on Wednesday at the start of the demonstrations, which followed the passing of an Ijaw deadline for oil companies to leave the region. Many military check-points had been set up, sporadic gunfire could be heard in the state capital Yenagoa over the weekend and tension remained high there, the Nigerian daily `The Guardian' today quoted local residents as saying. Medical services in Yenagoa ceased functioning after health workers fled to other towns, `The Guardian' added.
Abubakar warns of crack-down to quell unrest
The Nigerian head of state, General Abdulsalami Abubakar, said on Friday his government would crack down on the Niger Delta unrest, Reuters said. "While respecting human rights, we will not allow people to take order into their hands," he was quoted as saying. Human Rights Watch, in a statement released in New York on Thursday, condemned the fatal shooting by soldiers of Ijaw youths and called on the government to discipline or charge those responsible. The killings "raise concerns that the current government is returning to the repressive methods used by the Abacha regime," Human Rights Watch said in the statement. However, Bayelsa State Police Commissioner Nahum Eli said security forces had acted in self-defence, `The Guardian' reported today.
At least 12 youth activists, including Ijaw leader Timi Kaiser-Wilhem Ogoriba, were being detained at a military camp at Bori in Ogoni district, Reuters said. But AFP quoted a police spokesman as saying on Sunday that Ogoriba was being held in "protective custody". Meanwhile, six Nigerian employees of Chevron were being held hostage after they were abducted by Ijaw youths in the town of Warri to the west of the oil delta, Reuters said.
NIGERIA: Two Nigerian parties form alliance on candidate
Two of Nigeria's three political parties have agreed to field a common candidate for 27 February presidential elections under the military's plan to restore civilian rule, party officials said today. "We have decided to have a common candidate for the presidential elections, but we're still fine-tuning the process through which that candidate will emerge," Reuters quoted Tunji Adebiyi of the Alliance for Democracy (AD) as saying of the link-up with the All Peoples Party (APP).
The left of centre AD and the rightist APP were defeated in December local government elections by the centrist Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) which won about 60 percent of seats in the vote.
The two parties were originally joined but split because many AD members were opponents of late dictator Sani Abacha while APP leaders included members who backed Abacha's ambition to be elected as Nigeria's president.
NIGERIA: Committee recommends adopting 1979 constitution
A 26-member committee set up in November to organise a national debate on Nigeria's 1995 draft constitution has recommended the adoption of the country's 1979 constitution, according to weekend news reports. The committee, chaired by Federal Appeal Court Judge Niki Tobi, submitted its report last Wednesday. It recommended the military regime adopt the 1979 document with some amended provisions from the 1995 draft.
The 1979 constitution provided for a presidential system of government with a clear-cut separation of powers among the executive, legislature and judiciary, the independent newspaper `This Day' reported. The constitution also provided for a vice president and a multi-party system, the paper said.
NIGERIA: Nigeria brings in tight budget, scraps two-tier exchange rate
Nigeria has abolished the controversial dual exchange rate in a 1999 budget dominated by the collapse of the price of oil, news reports said. The budget, unveiled last Friday, is based on an estimated price of US $9.0 per barrel of oil compared with US $17 per barrel in the 1998 budget. The budget foresees a deficit of nearly US $400 million because of the fall in oil revenue.
Military ruler General Abdulsalami Abubakar said in his annual budget speech that the dual exchange rate was being abolished with immediate effect. It had given some branches of government access to foreign exchange at 22 naira to the dollar compared with a market rate of about 86 naira. International lending agencies had long demanded its abolition.
Abubakar said pre-shipment inspection of imports would also be abolished from April 1 to help remove bottlenecks at ports and gave the central bank autonomy over monetary policy. The privatisation of inefficient state enterprises would be speeded up before the restoration of civilian rule in May, he said.
WEST AFRICA: EU's Bonino puts off visit
The European Union's Humanitarian Affairs Commissioner Emma Bonino has postponed a visit to Guinea Bissau, Guinea, Sierra Leone and Senegal due to continued fighting in Sierra Leone, a European Commission official told IRIN today. The visit is now likely to take place in the first week of February, the official said.
Bonino had been due to visit refugees, IDPs and aid workers and to attempt to boost the peace process in Guinea Bissau, encouraging the two sides to respect the humanitarian aspects of the Abuja accord which ended the fighting.
EQUATORIAL GUINEA: General elections set for 6 March
General elections will be held in Equatorial Guinea on 6 March, AFP reported, quoting radio Malabo. According to a government decree read on the radio there will be one round of voting for the 80-seat national assembly with a simple majority deciding the winner. There are 13 official political parties including six opposition groups, AFP said. The current assembly is dominated by the Parti democratique de Guinee equatoriale (PDGE) which took 67 seats in the 1993 poll. The other seats went to allied parties, the opposition having boycotted the vote. The opposition also boycotted municipal and presidential polls in 1995 and 1996.
WEST AFRICA: CFA franc pegged to the euro
The Central Bank of West African States (BCEAO) has said the CFA franc has been pegged to the euro, via the French franc, at the rate of 655.957 fcfa to the euro. The parity to the French franc remains 100 to one. There had been speculation that the CFA franc would be devalued with the introduction of the euro in 11 European Union states, including France, on 1 January. The CFA franc is used in Benin, Burkina Faso, Guinea Bissau, Ivory Coast, Mali, Niger, Senegal and Togo in West Africa and in Cameroon, Central African Republic, Chad, Congo Republic, Equatorial Guinea and Gabon in Central Africa
Abidjan, 4 January, 1999, 17:30 GMT
[ENDS]
Date: Mon, 4 Jan 1999 18:23:15 +0000 (GMT) From: UN IRIN - West Africa <irin-wa@wa.ocha.unon.org> Subject: IRIN-West Africa Update 3721 for 1999.01.04
Editor: Ali B. Ali-Dinar
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