Mamman Nuhu

The Lake Chad Basin Commission (LCBC) is one of the oldest international organizations in Africa. It was created in 1964 with originally 4 members (Chad, Nigeria, Cameroon, Niger). Central African Republic was added in 1996 and Libya in 2008. The mandates of the organization are to manage the resources of the basin region, to preserve its ecological environment, and to promote regional integration as well as peace and stability. As such, it associates the management of political as well as technical issues and it interacts with national governments, international organizations, and populations of the region on multiple themes. On August 12, 2022, the Observatoire du multilatéralisme interviewed Ambassador Mamman Nuhu, the current Executive Secretary of the LCBC.

You began your career at the Nigerian Foreign Service, could you explain how you went from national diplomatic representation to a more multilateral position?

In the Nigerian Foreign Service, we are prepared for both multilateralism and bilateralism. Most of my career had been in the bilateral field, but I was also interested in multilateral issues during that period. If you look at the history of the LCBC, the first five Executive Secretaries were ambassadors. We pay a high premium in hydro-diplomacy and the need to actually promote multilateralism, which we believe is the best way forward in handling the situation that we have at hand in the Lake Chad Basin.

As the Executive Secretary of the LCBC, you represent the institution, not only as an Ambassador, but also as an individual. How would you say that your personality affects your work experience?

As an Ambassador, I am trained to work with other people, to take other people’s interest into consideration, to convince other people to get accomplish whatever they set out to do. It is why I talked about hydro-diplomacy in the first place: there is a need for collaborative efforts and synergy in what we are doing. I believe that somebody trained in diplomacy is in a better position to carry member countries along in handling bilateral and multilateral issues, rather than a highly technical person who is focused on the technicality of the job.

We lay emphasis on the relationships between members states and individuals. That is the main difference. Because you can have the best engineers and designs in the world, but if you are not able to sell it to member countries you will never be able to get the project off the ground. It is important to be diplomatic in your approach and your ability to get people onboard. That informed the decision in the first place to use diplomats as Executive Secretaries of the Commission.

The LCBC is about the management of water resources in an equitable and sustainable way. If you are going to manage and carry the people along, you need diplomacy. You also need the technical aspect of it, to be fair to everybody, to understand why the water should be shared, and how it should be shared. Both sides are important.

Since 2015, the LCBC also manages the Multi-National Joint Task Force (MNJTF). Would you say that it makes your mission more political (rather than technical)? How does it affect the nature of your mission?

I head the LCBC as Executive Secretary, and I am also the Head of Mission of the MNJTF. If you look at the three mandates of the LCBC, you will notice that the third one is to promote regional integration and safeguard peace and security in the basin. Since 1964 when the LCBC was created, the founding fathers had the foresight of knowing that there is security perspective to what the LCBC is supposed to be achieving: you can’t achieve the first two mandates without security. You need a safe and secure environment to effectively manage the waters of the lake in an equitable way or to conserve the ecosystem of the basin.

That is why when the member countries of the LCBC decided to create the MNJTF, it was easy for them to do that, because there was already a multilateral organization on the ground, which is charged with the responsibility of bringing the affected countries together, although not directly on security issues. It facilitated the establishment of the MNJTF.

I think the MNJTF fits into the already existing mandate of the LCBC. The MNJTF has been well coordinated by troop contributing countries from the LCBC and that is what makes it a model. It is a special organization facilitated by the multilateral organization that is already in place.

The OMVS has more development duties than the LCBC. They embark on huge projects, while in the LCBC, we only embark on transboundary projects. We don’t start projects that are best handled by individual countries. We don’t do major transboundary roads, dams, but we deal with environmental issues, with the management of the waters of rivers and Lake Chad itself to ensure that member countries use it in an equitable way, taking into consideration the interest of other member countries. Also, the LCBC has the additional security mandate which the OMVS does not have. Otherwise, we are both basin organization, similar in many ways.

What about the relations the LCBC has with other IO? Is multilateralism different in LCBC compared to the AU? Both are old multilateral organizations. Would you say that there is an African form of multilateralism, that could inspire other IO?

The difference between the LCBC and the AU is in terms of mandate: the LCBC doesn’t have direct political mandate. We don’t deal with political issues (except when it comes to dispute on issues concerning water) within member countries such as monitoring elections, which is done by the AU. This noninterference in political issues is also a difference with the ECOWAS.

When the Marshal of Chad, Idriss Déby Itno, died [in April 2021], the LCBC convened an extraordinary summit of heads of states and government during which we took political position for the first time in the history of the organization. We took position to try to find a way to accompany the transition program in Chad in such a way that it would end up in a peaceful and acceptable transition. We also have a Special Envoy specifically designated to accompany the Chadian transition, I have also been invited, to the opening of the inclusive sovereign national dialogue in Chad, so I will be there.

This is the only political action that the LCBC has taken, otherwise we don’t really delve into political matters, which is the difference between the LCBC and the AU and other organizations.

It is sometimes argued that multilateralism is in crisis, with the recent experience of MINUSMA in Mali and MONUSCO in DRC, to mention a few. How does this affect your work? Do you feel that there is more resistance or suspicion from populations or from member states towards your missions?

What we experience is the direct opposite of what you are saying: among the member countries of the LCBC, populations are sometimes far away from the central government, and development has not really been the same as it is in other parts of the country. With the presence of the LCBC, we have succeeded in bringing development closer to the people, which was not the case before. I think the LCBC has had a very positive impact in terms of bringing governance closer to the people of the LCBC rather than the opposite.

MINUSMA and MONUSCO deal more directly with political issues, that therefore may be why they face more suspicion. We don’t really deal with political issues; we deal with development issues. If somebody comes to your villages and gives you water and supplies that you didn’t have before, you are bound to appreciate it. We go to villages to give the wherewithal and improve the means of livelihoods of the people, efforts which are appreciated by the people. If there is flood in a particular village, we come, we solve the problem, that brings us closer to the people. We don’t experience problems of suspicion from the affected people, rather it is appreciation that we are noticing.