A picture taken on May 28, 2013 shows the Blue Nile in Guba, Ethiopia, during its diversion ceremony. AFP PHOTO / WILLIAM LLOYD GEORGE
Cairo/London, Asharq Al-Awsat—Ethiopia’s parliament has unanimously ratified a treaty which is seeking to replace colonial-era agreements granting Egypt and Sudan the largest share of the Nile’s water.
This treaty, which strips Egypt of its right to the lion’s share of the Nile waters, comes at a time of escalating tensions between the countries.
Speaking earlier this week, Egyptian President Mohamed Mursi warned: “We will defend each drop of Nile water with our blood if necessary.”
Speaking to Asharq Al-Awsat before the Ethiopian parliament’s decision, Khaled Wassef, spokesman for Egypt’s Ministry of Water Resources and Irrigation (MWRI), attempted to play down the crisis between the two countries, emphasizing that “Egypt’s stance is highly objective.”
He said that the so-called inflammatory rhetoric put forward by Mursi, including a statement that all options are on the table with regards to Egypt’s rights to the Nile river and its water, represents precisely the same discourse used by all former Egyptian presidents.
Wassef emphasized that when it comes to defending the Nile, Egypt’s stance has not changed throughout history, adding that this attitude is a characteristic of all previous Egyptian governments.
For his part, Ethiopian foreign ministry spokesman, Dina Mufti, said: “Ethiopia is not intimidated by Egypt’s psychological warfare and won’t halt the dam’s construction, even for seconds.”
However, Wassef responded: “Egypt does not aim to aggravate; rather, it is defending its ancient and historic right [to the Nile],” stressing that the government prefers to negotiate a solution with Ethiopia.
The Egyptian government intends to contact Ethiopia directly in order to “resolve the crisis and convey its message,” Wassef added.
The Egyptian official called on Ethiopia to take the findings of the technical report—which a number of Ethiopian experts have contributed to—into account. This technical account warns of potential “disastrous side-effects to the upstream countries (Egypt and Sudan).” He also called for Ethiopia to carry out more research before continuing construction of the dam.
South Sudan is set to host a summit of the Nile Council of Ministers of Water Affairs on June 20 to discuss ways to step up cooperation among the Nile Basin countries. South Sudan is expected to join the Entebbe Framework Agreement, which redistributes a number of countries’ allocations of Nile water—a step which will likely provoke anger in Egypt.
Six Nile-basin states, including Ethiopia, have signed a deal effectively stripping Cairo of its veto—based in colonial-era treaties—over dam projects on the Nile, the source of nearly all Egypt’s water.
Speaking exclusively to Asharq Al-Awsat, Ayman El-Gammal, Egyptian ambassador to South Sudan, said: “South Sudan should not enter into the Entebbe Framework Agreement.”
“Juba thinks that by entering into the agreement it will be able to mediate between upstream and downstream countries,” he added.
According to Gammal, Egypt is seeking to persuade all of the countries that have not signed the agreement, such as South Sudan, to start negotiations between the upstream and downstream countries in order to consolidate mutual cooperation among the Nile Basin countries.
In a contentious step, Ethiopia started to divert the Blue Nile waters last month, in preparation for a massive USD 4.2 billion Grand Ethiopian Renaissance Dam, provoking Egyptian animosity.
South Sudan calls on Egypt, Ethiopia to cooperate on Nile River development
June 14th, 2013 at 5:14 am
Xinhua | 2013-6-14 9:46:31
By Agencies
The construction of Ethiopia’s dam on the Blue Nile River will benefit current and future generations of Egypt, Sudan, and Ethiopia, said South Sudanese Official on Thursday.
The construction of the dam in Ethiopia would not affect adversely the interest of the other countries like Egypt or Sudan, said the Official.
Pagan Amum, Chief Negotiator of South Sudan told reporters in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia that South Sudan has followed with concern the development and statement from Egypt in relation to the construction of the dam in Ethiopia.
The official said that countries in the Nile basins should cooperate on the management of the Nile waters to benefit their current and future generations.
“Ethiopia has the right to use the Nile water in terms of generation of electricity, in terms of irrigation, and the way we see this development is that it is not affecting the interest of Sudan or Egypt,” he said.
“We call on the government of Egypt and the government of Ethiopia to engage and cooperate in all the developments that are going to be to the benefit all the people,” he added.
Stating that South Sudan is a new state and member of the Nile Basin Countries, Amum said his country would work with governments and states in the Nile basin to reach agreement on the use and sustainable management of the Nile waters for the benefit of the people in the Nile Basin region.
“The reason we chose to build the largest dam in Africa is to show to the Egyptians that if we are successful with this grand dam, nothing will stop us from building many other smaller dams over the Nile”. The dead Prime Minister of Ethiopia, Meles, in a speech to the Ethiopian parliament.
Source: http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=ILWYNjR4-TQ#!
This quote from the deceased Ethiopian dictator’s speech is a clear indication of Ethiopia’s sinister long term plan to build more dams on the Blue Nile. He scornfully referred to Egypt’s incessant opposition to any dam and said that Ethiopia cognizant of this fact, rather decided to challenge Egypt’s stance by inaugurating the largest dam in Africa. Ethiopia has a hydroelectric power capacity of 45,000 MW and that means it could have used its other several rivers instead of focusing on the Nile that they knew pretty well will reduce the quantity and quality of water reaching Egypt. Worse still, there are three more dams planned to be built on the Nile including for irrigation. I share Egypt’s concern and anger. This dam should be stopped before it is too late.
News of Ethiopia diverting the course of the Nile at the Renaissance dam site stirred up a political hornet’s nest in Egypt. The questions we should all ask are these: has Egypt been caught flat-footed by Ethiopia’s sudden announcement of the inauguration of the Nile dam? Why did Ethiopia choose to inaugurate the dam when Egypt was in political turmoil? Why wasn’t such a huge dam not included in Ethiopia’s Growth and Transformation Plan and hastily announced?
Ethiopia’s tinkering with the Nile will continue to be an albatross around Egypt’s neck posing an existential threat to its survival. This is not a storm in a tea cup or an ephemeral issue that could be ignored. Egypt is not naive to allow this to continue.
Turkish President Suleyman Demirel at the opening ceremony of the Ataturk Dam: “Neither Syria nor Iraq can lay claim to Turkey’s rivers any more than Ankara could claim their oil. This is a matter of sovereignty. We have a right to do anything we like. The water resources are Turkey’s, the oil resources are theirs. We don’t say we share their oil resources, and they cannot say they share our water resources.”
Be afraid with all this bear poking that the Ethiopian Gov. will take the above statement as a Policy of the country rather than the offer of win-win agenda where we all shall use it fairly. 85% of Nile comes from Ethiopia. Egypt could go to a war, but then again history shows us that they have tried twice before and twice they lost. Even after that the Ethiopian Heroes defeated colonizers want to be Italy – to be the only country in Africa that was not colonized. Be Afraid of the day Ethiopia says enough!