The discussion above has briefl y illustrated how the AU PSC and ECOWAS have coordinated their responses to contribute positively to the management of the crises affecting the two Guineas. However, there are areas where both organisa-tions can improve their intervenorganisa-tions and ensure that they have a more lasting effect. Firstly, the AU PSC needs to improve on the mechanisms for enforcing its decisions. Despite the fact that both organisations systematically issued a range of statements and directives, the regimes in the target countries, in this case the two Guineas, were essentially able to ignore these statements. As an illustration, despite all the efforts of the AU-ECOWAS collaboration in Guinea-Conakry, the signifi cant breakthrough that culminated in the signing of the Ouagadougou Joint Declaration only came after the violence of an attempted assassination removed junta leader Camara from the seat of power. Although Camara’s attempted as-sassination triggered the progress, this would not have happened if the AU and ECOWAS had not been engaging with the deteriorating situation with sustained commitment and resolution.
Secondly, there is a need for effective communication of the PSC’s decisions, and an improvement in the coordination of international efforts and activities in crisis zones and countries. Crisis zones tend to attract a multiplicity of inter-national actors, each with their own self-interest. The leading organisations, the AU and the relevant REC, need to lead international coordination in these regions because of their close proximity to the countries as well as their understanding of the political dynamics necessary for effective intervention. A relevant example
is the duplication of security sector reform (SSR) support to Guinea-Bissau, where over 14 different countries and organisations were involved. This multiplication of international intervention enabled the target in-country institutions to avoid making any fundamental changes.33
Thirdly, the AU PSC needs to show more consistency in its early response to crisis situations. Whereas the AU PSC is quick to respond to situations where there is an unconstitutional takeover of government or where a political assassi-nation takes place, as our case studies above demonstrate, there is a reluctance to engage with countries that have been embroiled with low-level confl icts and bad governance at an early stage. This allows situations to deteriorate to the point where violence erupts, at which point it becomes exponentially more diffi cult to resolve a dispute. The principle of sovereignty and non-intervention clearly con-tinues to impose constraints on the ability of the AU and ECOWAS, and other intergovernmental organisations, to intervene at an early stage. However, there is a perceptible incremental increase in the propensity of the AU and ECOWAS and similar organisations to utilise the gamut of norms, protocols and mechanisms to intervene in the affairs of their member states.
CONCLUSION
Non-democratic means of ascending to power are condemned and are frowned upon by the norms and principles of both the AU and ECOWAS.34 The permissive environment that enables so-called ‘special democracies’, which have not really undergone transition, to prevail created the context in which the recent experi-ences in Guinea-Conakry and Guinea-Bissau took place. This made it critical for the AU and ECOWAS not to ignore or dismiss the events in the two Guineas, but to use the opportunities generated to lay the foundations for stabilisation.35 The col-laborative efforts of the AU and ECOWAS in the two Guineas have illustrated the importance of intergovernmental organisations coordinating efforts to manage crises across the continent.
The situation in both countries is far from stabilised but there is a platform on which to build. In Guinea-Bissau, despite the election of a new president, security sector governance remains a major challenge. The deep mistrust among political and military elites, coupled with Guinea-Bissau’s status as a major hub for the traffi cking of narcotics, fosters transnational criminality, political instability and insecurity. As the authorities in Guinea-Conakry midwife the country hopefully
towards an enduring democratic culture, coordinated international support is critical. If both countries are genuinely to move forward, domestic stakeholders will have to be persuaded to agree to and internalise reform. In the fi nal analy-sis it is clear that the relationship between the AU and ECOWAS is evolving and, progressively, insights gained from joint interventions in countries like the two Guineas will provide useful insights for ongoing and future initiatives to promote peace and security in Africa.
NOTES
1 Although the objective of this chapter is to assess the PSC’s collaboration with ECOWAS in particular, the AU Commission/ ECOWAS collaboration is also discussed, which further demonstrates the progress that has been made in the areas of coordination and coherence between the AU PSC and African RECs.
2 See The Protocol on Relations between the AU and RECS, July 2007, Accra-Ghana, http://www.
afrimap.org/english/images/treaty/AU-RECs-Protocol.pdf (accessed 26 March 2010).
3 See Protocol relating to the establishment of the Peace and Security Council of the African Union (PSC Protocol), adopted by the 1st Ordinary Session of the Assembly of the African Union in Durban, South Africa, on 9 July 2002, Article 16, item 1b, http://www.africa-union.org/root/AU/organs/
psc/Protocol_peaceandsecurity.pdf (accessed 26 March 2010).
4 See the AU-RECs Memorandum of Understanding on Peace and Security, Article VII, item 4.
http://www.afrimap.org/english/images/treaty/AU-RECs-Protocol.pdf (accessed 26 March 2010).
5 ‘Interventionism’ in this instance does not exclusively refer to robust enforcement. In the context of this chapter’s analysis, the activities of preventive diplomacy and mediation are also categorised as intervention.
6 The ideas on and analysis of humanitarian intervention argued in this section are largely taken from an earlier paper by the author. See JT Lar, Making the case for humanitarian in-tervention: a threshold in African confl ict prevention and management, Journal of the Historical Society of Nigeria 17 (2008), 41–55.
7 Nicholas J Wheeler, Saving strangers: humanitarian intervention in international society, Oxford:
Oxford University Press, 2002, 29.
8 James Mayall, Introduction, in M Berdal and S Economides (eds), United Nations Interventionism 1991–2004, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2007, 4.
9 The responsibility to protect, Report of the International Commission on Intervention and State Sovereignty, http://www.iciss.ca/report-en.asp, xi (accessed 10 November 2010).
10 Article 4, paragraph H of the African Union Constitutive Act adopted in 2002 provides for ‘the right of the Union to intervene in a member state pursuant to a decision of the Assembly in respect of grave circumstances, namely: war crimes, genocide and crimes against humanity’.
11 Key among these normative frameworks are the Protocol on Democracy and Good Governance, and the ECOWAS Confl ict Prevention Framework (ECPF).
12 Francois Grignon, Africa peace-building agenda, ‘Guinea: the junta must leave,’ International Crisis Group, http://www.crisisgroup.org/text/index:cfm=6390 (accessed 26 March 2010).
13 For more on this analysis, see JT Lar, The ECOWAS SSR agenda in West Africa: looking beyond normative frameworks, KAIPTC Occasional Paper, 24, Kofi Annan International Peacekeeping Training Centre, Accra, Ghana.
14 Ibid., 105–107.
15 Obituary: President Vieira of Guinea Bissau, BBC News, http://news.bbc.co.uk/go/pr/fr/-/2/hi/
africa/7918462.stm (accessed 2 March 2009).
16 Dylan Hendrickson, Understanding and supporting security sector reform, a DFID handbook on SSR, London: Confl ict Security and Development Group (CSDG), King’s College, 2008, 8.
17 This section is largely taken from an earlier paper by the author. See JT Lar, The ECOWAS SSR agenda in West Africa: looking beyond normative frameworks, 5–7.
18 These two volumes are Alan Bryden, Boubacar N’Diaye, and Funmi Olonisakin (eds), Challenges of security sector governance in West Africa, DCAF, Lit Verlag, Münster, 2008, and Adedeji Ebo and Boubacar N’Diaye, (eds), Parliamentary oversight of the security sector in West Africa: op-portunities and challenges, DCAF, 2008.
19 This is a common way amongst ECOWAS staff of addressing member states that are still gov-erned by idiosyncratic dictators who are presiding over anything but democratic regimes.
20 Souaré explains this point effectively. See Issaka Souaré, Explaining the December 2008 mili-tary coup d’état in Guinea, Confl ict Trends (1) (2009), 27–33, http://accord_explainingdecember-2008militarycoupdetat_Guinea.pdf (accessed 26 March 2010).
21 Communiqué of the Peace and Security Council, 165th Meeting, 29 December 2008, Addis Ababa, Ethiopia http://www.africa-union.org/rppt/au/organs/165-Communique_Eng.pdf. (ac-cessed 26 March 2010).
22 Ibid.
23 Authority of Heads of State and Government suspends Guinea, http://www.ecowas.int/publi-cations/en/communique_fi nal10jan2009/comfi nal (accessed 28 March 2010).
24 Guinean President Shot Dead, BBC News, http://news.bbc.co.uk/go/pr/fr/-/2/hi/Africa/
7918061.stm (accessed 28 March 2010).
25 Communiqué Peace and Security Council, 174th Meeting, 3 March 2009. PSC/PR/Comm (CLXXIV) http://www.issafrica.org/uploads/PSC174COM.PDF (accessed 26 March 2010).
26 Ibid.
27 See Final Communiqué 1st Meeting of The International Contact Group on Guinea (ICG-G), Conakry, 15 February 2009, Communiqué fi nal de la 1 Session du GIC-G Conakry 15-02-2009 Eng.pdf. (accessed 27 March 2010).
28 See Final Communiqué of 10th Meeting of the International Contact Group on Guinea (ICG-G) Addis Ababa, 26 January 2010. Communiqué fi nal de la 10eme Session du GIC-G Addis Ababa 26-01-2010 Eng.pdf. (accessed 27 March 2010).
29 Communiqué of the African Union Peace and Security Council, 207th Meeting at the level of Heads of State and Government, 29 October 2009, Abuja Nigeria, PSC/AHG/COMM.2(CCVII).
30 Ibid.
31 A presidential candidate, Baciro Dabo, and Helder Proenca, a former defence minister, were assassinated on 5 June 2009 in the build up to the presidential elections. This was strongly condemned by ECOWAS and the AU PSC at its 192nd meeting held on 10 June 2009.
32 Communiqué of 37th Ordinary Meeting of the Authority of ECOWAS Heads of State and Government, Abuja, 16 January 2010, Ref.:CWW/HOSG/ABJ/37/Rev.1, http://www.ecowas.int/
publications/en/communique_fi nal/comfi nal.pdf (accessed 28 March 2010).
33 International Crisis Group, Guinea Bissau: beyond the rule of the gun, Africa Briefi ng, 61 (25 June 2009). Some of the countries and organisations involved include Portugal, Nigeria, Spain, Brazil, France, UK, UNDP, EU, ECOWAS, and Angola. More recently the AU and ECOWAS have been mandated to lead the process, with support from the UN.
34 The AU and RECs, like ECOWAS, have developed norms and protocols that uphold democratic principles and the rule of law; for example, ECOWAS has the Protocol on Democracy and Good Governance.
35 Currently an international contact grouping led by ECOWAS is engaged in assisting and sup-porting Guinea towards a democratic transition.