Water Wars: Egyptians Condemn Ethiopia's Nile Dam Project
As the Grand Ethiopian Renaissance Dam takes shape, tempers rise.
Peter Schwartzstein in Cairo, National Geographic
<
http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2013/09/130927-grand-ethiopian-rena
issance-dam-egypt-water-wars/>
September 28, 2013
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"Ethiopia is killing us," taxi driver Ahmed Hossam said, as he picked his
way through Cairo's notoriously traffic-clogged streets. "If they build this
dam, there will be no Nile. If there's no Nile, then there's no Egypt."
Projects on the scale of the $4.7 billion, 1.1-mile-long
(1.7-kilometer-long) Grand Ethiopian Renaissance Dam often encounter
impassioned resistance, but few inspire the kind of dread and fury with
which most Egyptians regard plans to dam the Blue Nile River.
Egypt insists Ethiopia's hydroelectric scheme amounts to a violation of its
historic rights, a breach of the 1959 colonial-era agreement that allocated
almost three-fourths of the Nile waters to Egypt, and an existential threat
to a country largely devoid of alternative freshwater sources.
But what Egyptians regard as a nefarious plot by its historic adversary to
control its water supply, Ethiopians see as an intense source of national
pride and a symbol of their country's renewal after the debilitating famines
of the 1980s and '90s.
"People are enthusiastic. They're excited, because no leader has tried such
a project in Ethiopia's history," said Bitania Tadesse, a recent university
graduate from the capital, Addis Ababa. "It's a big deal that is going to be
beneficial to future generations."
Intense Water Politics
Ethiopia maintains that Egypt and Sudan downstream have no reason to be
fearful. The government says it's merely redressing the inequalities of
previous water-sharing arrangements, which had left the nine upstream
countries largely bereft of access to the Nile.
But the changing regional dynamic is a tough pill for Egypt to swallow.
For decades it has used its regional clout to stymie the dam-building plans
of its impoverished upstream neighbors. International organizations, such as
the World Bank, which has financed hydroelectric ventures in the past, shied
away from involvement in such a controversial proposal, handing Egypt a de
facto veto.
But weakened by several years of economic and political unrest in the
aftermath of the Arab Spring, Egypt now finds itself ill-placed to counter a
resurgent Ethiopia.
A total of "98 percent of Egypt's freshwater comes from outside its borders,
and it has exceptionally little leverage," said Angus Blair, an economic and
political analyst at Cairo's Signet Institute. "The answer lies with working
with its neighbors."
Thus far, however, Egypt has taken a largely belligerent stance.
State and private media have whipped up a current of fierce anti-Ethiopian
sentiment, with the several-thousand-strong Oromo community in Egypt bearing
the brunt of public suspicion and rage. Many Oromo Ethiopian refugees have
been the victims of physical assaults, according to the UN, while a number
of online bulletins solicited apartments for Ethiopians after many were
evicted from their homes and deprived of medical care in hospitals.
Egypt's politicians were no less inflammatory in their rhetoric.
"Building a dam is tantamount to a declaration of war," a senior Nour Party
official said back in June, as he proposed Egyptian support for various
separatist movements within Ethiopia if the dam's construction continued.
President Mohamed Morsi also weighed in with a veiled threat shortly before
his ouster in a popularly supported military coup in early July, saying that
"all options are available to us."
Some Egyptians blame Morsi and his Islamist Muslim Brotherhood group for the
dam's fast progress. "They wanted an Islamic caliphate. They didn't care
about Egypt as a country, so they did nothing to stop this dam," said
shopkeeper Karim Abdallah. But Egypt's position has, if anything, weakened
since Morsi's overthrow.
Egypt's southern neighbor, Sudan, has switched sides and chosen to support
the dam, not least because Sudan had agreed to an Egyptian request to build
an airbase near the Ethiopian border, according to Wikileaks.
"Sudan understands that the dam is in its interests," said Harry Verhoeven,
who teaches African politics at the University of Oxford. "It will be able
to import the cheap energy it desperately needs.
"Egypt [also] needs to bite the bullet," he added. "Instead of fearing the
dam, Egypt should see it as an opportunity to move closer to a region it has
traditionally spurned."
Former Egyptian president Hosni Mubarak is often accused of having neglected
his African neighbors, and some feel Egypt is now paying the penalty for its
preoccupation with its place in the Arab world. "Egypt cannot continue to
hurt black Africa and the countries of the tropics of Africa," said Ugandan
president Yoweri Museveni this past summer.
Need for Water
Still, Egypt's concerns are far from groundless. Its population is forecast
to almost double to 150 million by 2050, so as demand for water surges, its
supply will be restricted by the dam. Ethiopia says it's an "unrealistic
conception" that the dam will damage Egypt, but for a few years at least
(the time it will take for the dam's reservoir to fill), Egypt and Sudan
will have to contend with reduced water flow.
Egypt fears that storing water behind the Ethiopian dam will reduce the
capacity of its own Lake Nasser (thereby reducing the power-generating
capacity of Egypt's giant hydroelectric plant at Aswan). Ethiopian officials
have sought to allay fears by pointing out that storing water in the cooler
climes of the Ethiopian lowlands will ensure much less water is lost to
evaporation, but Egyptians are unconvinced.
"The production of electricity at the Aswan High Dam is likely to drop by
almost 40 percent should the Ethiopian dam be built," concluded Nader
Noureddin, a professor of agriculture at Cairo University.
Such unease has spawned a bevy of wild theories as to how Ethiopia, poorer
and more populous than Egypt, can afford its extensive dam-building program
(20 dams in total). "Israel and the U.S. are behind it," insist a number of
Egyptian Islamist politicians. "The Chinese are funding this to get back at
us for supporting the Americans," a friend in Cairo recently suggested.
The Chinese are certainly involved, but there's nothing conspiratorial about
it. Chinese state-owned Sinohydro is the world's largest dam builder and
accounts for over 50 percent of recently constructed dams. "China simply
sees this as terrific business," Verhoeven said.
The Ethiopian government insists it's capable of raising the necessary funds
itself, and the country's sizeable diaspora is helping out. Tadle Haile, a
retired school counselor from Northern Virginia, has given money, and said
that "everybody I've talked to [in the Ethiopian community] says they have
as well." The Ethiopian Embassy in Washington even offers advice on how to
buy bonds to finance the dam.
But how much longer the country will be able to self-finance its ambitious
projects is a contentious issue. State employees have already been "invited"
to surrender a month's salary, and "there is a collectivist pressure to
accept," lawyer Daniel Berhane said. "Few Ethiopians would dare complain
about anything to do with the Nile, as it's a symbol of patriotism."
The dam is now 20 percent built, and on schedule to be completed by 2017,
according to Ethiopian officials. The Grand Renaissance Dam, it seems, is
going to get built. But what happens next depends on how Egypt adjusts to
its changed circumstances.
"Egypt needs to wake up to the new world," Verhoeven said. "This doesn't
need to be a problem."
Received on Sat Sep 28 2013 - 13:51:28 EDT