President Paul Kagame during a panel discussion on the Sahel future
President Paul Kagame has admitted that the Sahel problem is really complex, but can be solved if players are coordinated for the better use of resources that are required to deal with it.
For the last 40 years, the United Nations (UN) and other players, have been struggling to end an ongoing conflict between the revolutionary Polisario Front and the Kingdom of Morocco.
Sahel problem has grown to make the region a home to terrorism, transnational organized crimes, migrants, famine, effects of climate change which are synonym of insecurity.
This has become a global concern and President Kagame who is current chairperson of the African Union has been giving his stand on how the problem can be dealt with and concluded.
On the sidelines of the ongoing Munich Security Conference, President Kagame was part of a panel discussion on Securing the Sahel.
“There are many efforts whether by the UN, Sahel or EU on fixing the Sahel security situation – the key point is not the number of people contributing but rather how do they all coordinate so that there is no overlaps and wasted resources,” Kagame said.
In January this year, the UN Secretary General’s Special Envoy for Western Sahara conflict and former Germany President, Horst Köhler, held talks with President Kagame to discuss about the Western Sahara situation in Kigali.
At Munich, on Saturday, Kagame said, “Africa is increasingly trying to address such problems by building efficient institutions to try and meet the needs of this global wider challenge so that we can all contribute to the efforts intended to stabilize the continent and develop as we should.”
He also said, “We must fully empower and support the people directly concerned with the Sahel problem. It’s a complex problem but I believe it is not insurmountable if we can do the right things in the right way in the right time.”
The problems in the Sahel region, he said, have become global challenges. We need to find a different configuration of utilizing the resources available to become more effective. I don’t know why no one raises this point.
Kagame was on the same panel of discussion with World Bank President Jim Yong Kim, President Roch Marc Kaboré of Burkina Faso, Malian Foreign Affairs Minister Tiéman Coulibaly and the African Union Commission chairperson Moussa Faki.
Kim concurs with President Kagame that, “if we don’t invest in the right thing, the problem of Sahel and other struggling regions will worsen.”
