Fighting over the Nile could drown us all

The world’s longest river, the Nile, begins its journey in the heart of East Africa.

The White Nile can be traced to the Kagera in southern Rwanda and flows through Tanzania, and into Lake Victoria.

As the White Nile makes its way north, crossing through Uganda’s north of Lake Victoria and into Sudan, the Blue Nile is descending from its source in Lake Tana in the Ethiopian highlands and flows into Sudan from the southeast.

The Blue Nile is the source of most of the Nile’s water. The two rivers converge at Khartoum, and continue their journey north as one into Egypt and on to the Mediterranean Sea.

But back in East Africa, other tributaries rise from the DR Congo, Kenya, Tanzania, Rwanda, and Burundi and drain into Lake Victoria, creating the larger Nile Basin.

On a map, the Nile appears to flow upwards, from south to north, but in reality it flows downhill, covering 6,695 kilometres on the way to Egypt.

Known to the world today as the Nile, from the Greek word “Nelios,” meaning River Valley, the ancient Egyptians named it Ar, meaning “black,” because of the black flood sediments it deposited on its banks.

In Uganda they call it Omugga Kiyira; in Ethiopia the Amharic name for the river is Abay.

The Nile is and always has been a source of life and prosperity.

In ancient times, the Nile spawned civilisations and empires. Agriculture, trade, and industry flourished as populations converged around this life source.

In our times, the Nile has made irrigation, hydropower and industry possible.

But in a region — East Africa — plagued by food insecurity, poverty and climate change, the inevitable conflict has simmered over the years, boiling down to the modern day Nile challenge: Can the 10 Nile basin states agree on sustainable and equitable ways of harnessing the Nile waters to their mutual benefit?

Egypt, the farthest country downstream, has been to date the greatest beneficiary of the Nile and continues to hang on to its claim of historical rights to the greatest share of the Nile waters with a death grip.

Indications are, however, that times are changing, as the sub-Saharan Nile basin states are asserting firmly their right to a fair share of the waters of a river that rises from sources in their country.

Add into the mix South Sudan’s impending independence, and its control of what is a fairly large portion of the Nile downstream, and it becomes clear that the hydropolitics of the Nile are on the verge of a new dawn.