Terrorism,insurgency, kidnapping,and security in Africa's energy sector

Energy continues to serve as the bedrock of modern economies and the main driver of modern society. For Africa, the production and supply of energy resources such as crude oil, natural gas, uranium, coal, biomass, biofuels and other renewables are an important source of employment, rents, taxes, royalties and profits. This sector brings in several tens of billions of dollars of revenue annually. The production and delivery of such resources, however, depend on critical infrastructures such as pipelines, refineries, processing plants, terminals, rigs, electrical energy pylons, substations, pump stations, vessels, and tankers. These infrastructures have been attacked by terrorists, insurgents, vandals and saboteurs, all of whom see them as targets against which to register their grievances and extract concessions from the state. This paper is a chronological account of some of the documented incidents of terrorism, insurgency, kidnapping, destruction, sabotage, and human casualties suffered in the oil and gas sectors in Africa between 1999 and 2012. It is based on data extracted from the databases of the RAND Database of World Terrorism Incidents and the University of Maryland's Global Terrorism Database (GTD).     

Africa's Moment

Over the past decade, international efforts to end protracted conflict in Africa have directed large streams of funds towards the disarmament, demobilisation and reintegration of former combatants in rural areas. While designed as an integrated approach, the emphasis tends to lie on short time frames of transition through centrally managed programmes that narrowly target ‘the demobilised’. Despite the good intentions of these programmes, there are a number of questions that need to be answered, particularly how the beneficiaries perceive them. This essay tries to answer some of these questions by analysing Caluquembe, a district in central Angola where villagers were subjected to violence on an everyday basis, and where since the war ended in 2002 hundreds of former UNITA soldiers and their families were reintegrated. The essay argues that the ongoing ‘normalisation’ efforts of reintegrating displaced people and demobilised soldiers are facing a number of challenges due to the narrow targeting of benefits, the lack of involvement of local government, the absence of any form of national reconciliation, and the emphasis on economic reintegration in an environment of extreme poverty and social exclusion. The essay also draws a number of lessons that could benefit reintegration efforts in the Great Lakes Region, particularly for the Democratic Republic of Congo and Burundi.