Water and Politics in Africa

The Lake Chad Basin seen from Apollo 7, October 1968. Source .  Building on from last week’s discussions of transboundary water resources in N RB , this week I will be exploring the Lake Chad Basin (LCB), which is shared by eight riparian countries and consists of a staggering 47 million people, covering 8% of the African continent ( Galeazzi et al ). It is revealed that whilst the LCB faces a plethora of challenges in the form of environmental issues, the lingering effects of colonial legacies and contemporary terrorist activity, unlike the NBA, no effectual transboundary agreement exists.     A common trend in much of my reading, the effects of colonialism remain, proving detrimental in the case of the LCB, heightening access inequalities ( Marthur and Mulwafu ), with a need to decolonise water rights being addressed as vital to much of Africa’s future development ( Van Koppen, 2018 ). The Maga Dam on the Logone-chari River for example, built in Cameroon during th...

As addressed in previous blogs, water in West African nations such as Nigeria and Côte d’Ivoire is facing severe challenges in the form of misallocation and pollution, with climate change heightening pressures further ( Kundzewicz et  al.,  2007 ).   These issues are compounded by the transboundary nature of water in the region, with my next two blogs investigating such  shared water resources in  West Africa and the  cooperative strategies employed to alleviate tensions and negotiate more equitable utilisation of water ( Tawfik, 2016 ). It can be noted that 90% of all of Africa’s surface freshwater is in the form of river basins and lakes that are shared by two or more nations ( Goulden et al, 2010 ), with transboundary aquifers (TBAs) representing an estimated 42% of the continental area ( Altchenko and Villholth, 2013 ). I was astonished at the true extent of such transboundary water resources in West Africa specifically, with all countries in this regio...

This week’s blog will not solely look at the role of China’s interventions in West Africa as part of its Africa-wide “Going Global Strategy” as previously discussed, but addresses how my future blogs and wider research must consider the often-missing voices of African scholars.  It is evident that individuals have their own pre-conceptions and positionality, with ideas of Orientalism living on academically, as a part of the West’s political unconscious ( Shatz, 2019 ), and imaginative geographies persisting in the form of ‘othering’ ( Aitken, 2005 ), with themes of ‘saving’ the continent and ‘making poverty history’ ( Mahadeo, 2007 ) pervading throughout Western media and academic writings, perpetuating popular stereotypes ( Michira, 2002 ). The work of Martin Scott was central in highlighting the substantial gaps in analyses of Western media, with a tendency of news outlets and researchers to focus on negative topics ( Scott, 2015 ;  Stabler, 2018 ), ignoring the actualities ...