Statement by H. E. Dr. Jean Ping, Chairperson of the African Union Commission At the 8th Ordinary Session of the CISSA Conference Monday, 6 June 2011, Khartoum, Sudan

Statement by H. E. Dr. Jean Ping, Chairperson of the African Union Commission At the 8th Ordinary Session of the CISSA Conference Monday, 6 June 2011, Khartoum, Sudan

Statement by H. E. Dr. Jean Ping, Chairperson of the African Union Commission At the 8th Ordinary Session of the CISSA Conference Monday, 6 June 2011, Khartoum, Sudan

ADDIS ABABA, Ethiopia, June 6, 2011/African Press Organization (APO)/ — Statement by H. E. Dr. Jean Ping.

Your Excellency Field Marshal Omar Hassan AL BASHIR (if present)
President of the Republic of the Sudan,
Honourable Chairperson of CISSA,
Colonel Philippe OBARA,
Honourable incoming Chairperson of CISSA,
Lt. General Engineer Mohamed Atta Mula ABBAS,
Distinguished Directors General of Intelligence and Security Services of Africa,
Distinguished Guests,
Your Excellencies,
Ladies and Gentlemen.

It is an honour and, indeed, a privilege for me to address the opening ceremony of the 8th ordinary session of the CISSA Conference.

This session of the CISSA Conference is taking place at a time of remarkable political changes in Sudan, as well as epochal changes in the political landscape of Africa especially the political revolutions that occurred in Tunisia and Egypt and the sad events unfolding in Libya, as well as the recent political crises in Cote d’Ivoire. We all must make concerted efforts to learn from the causes and handling of these crises to be able to retain the lessons learned, both in terms of the yearning for the democratization process by our people and the structural prevention of crisis and conflicts in the continent.

It is important to also mention the continuing challenges posed by the prevailing situation in Somalia, a country torn by two decades of violence and lack of structures of State, as well as in this beautiful country, Sudan, with the persistence of the crisis in Darfur and the current crisis in Abyei which has its negative toll on the remarkable progress we have collectively achieved towards the implementation of the Comprehensive Peace Accord.

There are, obviously, other issues of concern for the AU, namely; the security situation in the Great Lakes region and in Western Sahara, the persistent deadlock between Ethiopia and Eritrea, the relationship between Eritrea and Djibouti, the coordination of regional efforts against the criminal activities of the Lord Resistance Army, the strengthening of cooperation in the fight against Terrorism, sea piracy and other violent forms of organized crimes as well as the consolidation of Peace and Democracy in post conflict countries in our continent.

Your Excellencies,
Ladies and Gentlemen.

While the current state of Peace and Security in our continent is fraught with these not-so-encouraging developments, we should not lose sight of some positive events that took place during the last couple of months in our collective quest for Peace and stability.

Allow me, at this point in time, to salute the return to constitutional orders in Guinea and Niger, the holding of a peaceful referendum for the self determination of Southern Sudan and the commitment of the Sudanese parties to accede to the building of two viable and vibrant states, living side by side in peaceful cohabitation and working together to tackle the challenges of social development, and last but not least, the end of the post electoral crisis in Cote d’Ivoire and the official swearing in of President Alassane Dramane Ouattara as the legitimate President of that country.

Your Excellency, Mr. President,
Distinguished Directors General of Intelligence and Security
Services of Africa,
Your Excellencies,
Ladies and Gentlemen.

While we can all together salute these positive developments, there is no doubt that tremendous challenges still lie ahead of us and CISSA has the responsibility to help us effectively deal with some of them.

During my first meeting with the then CISSA Troika, in 20 November 2008, in my office at the AUC Headquarters in Addis Ababa, I underscored the importance of CISSA as a continental body with the mission and capability to hear, see and uncover what many other institutions cannot do, and do it ahead of everybody else. In this regard, I emphasized on a number of threats to Peace and Security in our continent and we agreed, both the AUC and CISSA, on the need to work together, in concerted efforts, to address them.

I recall that in our discussions at that time, I told the CISSA Troika that, as far as the AUC was concerned, the threats confronting our continent included the following:

1- Political instability, which has led to the failure of certain states and the weakening of the structures of some others;
2- Intra state conflicts, mainly as a result of power struggle, inequitable distribution of wealth, corruption, irredentism and poverty;
3- Unconstitutional change of power such as in Madagascar and elsewhere;
4- Organized crime in all its forms (human trafficking, cyber crime, drug and small arms trafficking, forgery of travel and school documents, money laundering, etc.)
5- Brain drain and illegal migration to Europe and the United States;
6- Endemic poverty and lack of infrastructure; and
7- Endemic diseases such as HIVAIDS. Tuberculosis, Malaria, cholera etc.

I regret to say that those threats are still there and may have, in fact, become more serious. In addition, elections, which ought to be the epitome of democracy, have become a powerful source of conflict and instability in a number of countries in our continent. Despite some success stories in Angola, Guinea Bissau, Mozambique, Tanzania and most recently in Ghana, Comoros, Cape Verde, Niger, Djibouti, Benin, Chad and Nigeria, we all know the difficulties of the Ivorian election and the struggles that followed afterwards. We are still faced with potentially difficult elections in Kenya and Zimbabwe and the Commission will appreciate all early warning signals from these countries to assist us to deal with the problems before they escalate.

I must commend the CISSA Secretariat for producing some good Intelligence analysis and summary which have been of great use to the AUC and we believe more needs to be done in this regard. We continue to count on and trust CISSA in this crucial area. CISSA can, indeed, play a crucial role in strengthening the AU Peace and Security Architecture. However, we still need CISSA to help in providing information in advance of the occurrence of such phenomenal events that we have witnessed in Africa. Since the CISSA Secretariat cannot do this on its own, you, the Heads of the various services, need to come to its rescue, and ours! I believe I can count on you to do this.

Your Excellencies
Dear participants
Ladies and Gentlemen

It goes without saying that Peace and Security matters have regrettably been the face of the AU. More than 6 High level meetings (at the level of Ministers and Heads of States) have taken place this year alone to try to address the conflicts in Cote d’Ivoire and Libya alone. The latest was the Extraordinary Session of the Assembly of the Union on the state of Peace and Security in Africa, which was held in Addis Ababa, on 25-26 May 2011, under the theme “Enhancing Africa’s leadership, promoting African Solutions”. Again, the situation in Libya dominated this summit.

During this and other meetings, the Assembly reiterated its conviction that only a political solution to the current conflict would be possible to promote sustainable peace in Libya and fulfil the legitimate aspirations of the Libyan people to democracy, rule of law, respect for human rights and good governance, as well as preserve the unity and territorial integrity of Libya. The meetings also reiterated the need for an immediate cease fire and all attacks and abuses against civilians in line with the UN Security Council Resolution 1973(2011) and the AU PSC Decisions and for the ceasefire to be monitored by a credible, effective and verifiable international mechanism.

The AU remains resolute that the roadmap for the settlement of this crisis adopted by the High level Panel during its meeting of 10 March 2011 is the best platform towards achieving a peaceful and lasting solution of the political conflict in Libya taking into account the provisions of Chapter VIII of the UN Charter and paragraph 2 of Decision 1973 (2011) of the UN Security Council. But this roadmap needs to be consolidated by constant intelligence, analysis and prognosis that CISSA can provide.

Another important issue which was debated during the Extraordinary Session of the Assembly of the Union on the state of Peace and Security in Africa was the issue of “Leadership”. This issue of leadership is extremely important in view of the general tendency of some international actors to deny Africa the central role in the quest for a solution for the Libyan conflict. It is obvious that Africa cannot be reduced to the role of a mere observer of its own misfortune, hence, the theme “Enhancing Africa’s leadership, promoting African Solutions”.

The leadership in question here entails enhanced concerted efforts among all the key actors, bold initiatives to address our problems, mobilization of more resources within the continent in support of our agenda for peace and security and, last but not least, strengthened unity of action under the AU banner. It is my strong conviction that CISSA could help us bridge the gap between our aspirations and deeds. Only well informed and intelligence-supported decision making process can help us prevent the advent of more conflicts and generate the long lasting peace and security which we all long for in our continent.

The recent happenings in North Africa and Cote d’Ivoire as well as here in Sudan, stretched the AU to the limit and tend to diminish the great milestones reached in implementing the Comprehensive Peace Agreement through the successful referendum held in South Sudan. It would be appreciated if you would come up with initiatives that would help facilitate the Abyei situation and indeed all conflict situations in Africa.

I once again thank our host, General Abbas, and through him, his Government and the people of Sudan for their kindness and very warm hospitality.

I wish you very fruitful deliberations and thank you for your kind attention.

Office of the Chairperson
AU Headquarters