How to read Africa’s move

Posted on 04. Nov, 2009 by Ole Seidenberg in Africa, Germany, Video

The African Group's press conference

It has been another hectic day on Tuesday – packed with events, meetings, press conferences and speeches, but above all, their has been a rather interesting strategic move by the African Group that we should have a closer look at. As some of you might have read elsewhere in the daily news, Gambia spoke on behalf of the African Group yesterday and underpinned their expectation of more ambitious mitigation targets and more concrete financial offers by both the EU and the US, as well as other developed countries in order to continue the negotiations within the Kyoto track.

Wow, that seems to be big news, doesn’t it? But while it is easy to assume this might be a clever move by African states to strengthen their often sidelined position, I have heard a number of rather diverse interpretations while talking to my friends from different NGO-backgrounds during the day. I won’t name those colleagues here, but I will draw on their experience to give you some ideas on how politically unclear situations like these influence the thoughts of strategists, the press and others – often in very different ways. The first, most insightful statement regarding this move, however, might be this video interview that I took with Grace Akumu from Kenya, right after she had presented the African position in a special press conference yesterday afternoon:

Now, what could this possibly mean?

1) It could be an authentic outcry by African Countries – a move to make clear that they DO play a very important role in these negotiations and are capable to officially blame and shame the developed world by putting on hold the whole negotiation process for a while. They are more than beggers in this and they deserve to be treated respectfully. This move might be the first strong message to their developed counterpart that actually mobilizes enough pressure to see some movement here.

2) It could be a move planned and pushed forward by those African Countries that are also part of OPEC and want to slow down negotiations anyway motivated by rather egoistic goals. Algeria was leading the press conference on the African Groups statement yesterday – and Algeria has been well known for wanting Adaptation money to flow into their pockets due to decreasing oil-business… (they have even been awarded the Fossil of the Day Award for that in Bangkok). But: There has not been any official OPEC meeting with plans to block the Kyoto track of Negotiations. So it seems to be an African move, not an OPEC-led idea.

3) It was interesting to see that South Africa was not part of the Group when the blocking of the negotiations was announced by the Gambia. It didn’t seem to be well planned in the first place, but it did draw some attention of the press nonetheless.

4) Developed nations (among them those that want to get rid of the Kyoto Protocoll anyway) might use this move by Africa to argue that it’s not their fault if Kyoto cannot survive this process, since Africa has started to block the process…

5) Listen to the video up there – Grace is saying that Africa did not walk out, but just demands more ambitious mitigation and finance numbers by developed nations… right after the interview, she told me that people back home “would kill” her if she just walked out of this without trying her best to keep the process in tact. Well, powerful words, huh?

After all, negotiations resumed last night – and the African Group did find a compromise when talking with the AWG-KP (Ad Hoc Working Group on the Kyoto Protocol) Chair – now, the list of agenda items is apparently going to be re-prioritised so that more of the time spent in the group will be dedicated to “talking about numbers”…. Well, let’s see, what reality brings…but as it stands, this is – as far as I am concerned – a good signal and shows that Africa cannot be ignored on the way to Copenhagen!

Tags: African Group, Blocking Tacktic, Emission targets, Grace Akumu, Kyoto Track