Drug Trade in Broader Context

14 June 2011

“In Guinea-Bissau, drug trafficking … is a consequence of the pre-existing lack of stability that allows smugglers to establish their networks in the region and operate to and from there. Ignoring the structural causes of the problem (endemic poverty, corruption, impunity) will have an even deeper impact on the local population than the illegal drug trade, and will leave unaddressed the very conditions that continue to foster trafficking opportunities in the future.” – February 2011 report from Norwegian Peacebuilding Center

This AfricaFocus Bulletin contains (1) a recent essay by Marie Gibert from the African Arguments website, warning against allowing stereotypes about the drug trade to obscure the possibility of progress on other fronts even in such difficult conditions, and (2) excerpts from a recent comprehensive analysis from Norwegian Peacebuilding Center of the international cocaine trade in Guinea-Bissau.

Another AfricaFocus Bulletin, sent out today by e-mail and available on the web at http://www.africafocus.org/docs11/wod1106.php, contains excerpts from the new report from the Global Commission on Drug Policy, arguing for a fundamental change in the global approach to the “war on drugs,” Continuing an approach based primarily on prohibition and law enforcement, the report argues, will not only fail to stop drug addiction and trafficking, but will also continue to fuel the growth of criminal violence and expansion of other negative consequences to more vulnerable populations, such as in Guinea-Bissau and other African countries.

Also of interest, a series of photographs on Guinea-Bissau by photographer Ernst Schade, at http://www.ernstschade.com/index.php?page=guinea-bissau-2006

A summary of trends in the international drug trade in Africa can be found in Chapter III of the Annual Report of the International Narcotics Control Board, at http://www.incb.org/incb/en/annual-report-2010.html

For previous AfricaFocus Bulletins on Guinea-Bissau, visit http://www.africafocus.org/country/guineabissau.php

Additional links and background are also available in “Guinea-Bissau: In Need of a State”, July 28, 2008 http://www.africafocus.org/docs08/gb0807.php  – Editor’s Note

Guinea-Bissau: A Narco-Developmental State?

May 24, 2011

By Marie Gibert

Marie Gibert is a postdoctoral research fellow in the Department of International Relations, University of the Witwatersrand, Johannesburg, South Africa.

[For full text, including footnotes, see http://www.africanarguments.org

This article appeared in African Arguments Online, a new venture from the Royal African Society and partner organizations, featuring blogging from notables such as Alex de Waal and Richard Dowden, plus an interactive facility for comment and discussion. It is divided into 5 strands: African politics Now, Making Sense of Sudan, Rethinking Zimbabwe, the Central Africa Forum and Asia in Africa.

For a report on an earlier seminar on the situation in GuineaBissau, held in November 2010, see http://www.royalafricansociety.org / direct URL: http://tinyurl.com/4jvygxl]

Guinea-Bissau has repeatedly, over the past few years, been dubbed a ‘narco-state’. This label has tended to be associated with the image of a dysfunctional ‘failed’ state. Yet, a recent report published by the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and the World Bank shows remarkable improvements in the country’s health and education sectors and calls for a more qualified understanding of the country’s politics.

The evidence that supported the “narco-state” label was generally sketchy, but nevertheless undeniable. As in other West African countries, the Bissau-Guinean police have seized a number of major drug shipments from traffickers and planes — generally originating from Latin America and headed to Europe — in past years. Expensive cars allegedly owned by drugtraffickers or their allies were also seen in ever greater numbers in the streets of Bissau. The ‘narco-state’ tag was further strengthened by visible links between representatives of the state and drug-trafficking networks, as some of the arrested traffickers and seized drugs later vanished from the state’s prisons and coffers, with no explanation forthcoming from the Bissau-Guinean authorities. Another sign of criminal state complicity was in the rapid and ostensible enrichment of some of Guinea-Bissau’s senior military officers.

Although the government of Guinea-Bissau has signalled its willingness to address the issue, the series of political crises since 2009 has made this task very difficult. In spite of the peaceful legislative and presidential elections that took place in November 2008 and June-July 2009, the coup attempts, political assassinations and army mutinies during the same period underlined the persistent and violent rivalries in Guinea-Bissau’s political leadership.

The assassinations, on 1st March 2009, of the head of the armed forces, General Batista Tagme Na Wai, and of the president, João Bernardo (“Nino”) Vieira, paradoxically raised hopes. Many thought that the personal antagonism between the two men accounted in great part for the political paralysis preventing essential reforms, first and foremost in the security sector. In spite of the violence that preceded and marked the subsequent presidential election campaign, the smooth running of the two election rounds and the unanimous, domestic and international, recognition of its result — the election of Malam Bacai Sanh´, of the ruling party PAIGC — as democratic and transparent, raised hope that Guinea-Bissau was finally entering a new era of peace and greater prosperity.

The return in December 2009 of Rear-Admiral José Américo Bubo na Tchuto — who had been accused of organising a failed coup attempt in August 2008 and had taken refuge in The Gambia — and the army mutiny organised by some of his allies the following April, however, cast a further shadow on Guinea-Bissau’s future. The events led to the dismissal of Chief of Staff General Zamora Induta, who had been appointed following his predecessor’s assassination and had promised to proceed with the long awaited reform of the army. It also saw the reinstatement of RearAdmiral Bubo na Tchuto, cleared from charges of coup attempt and involvement in drug-trafficking activities by a military court, at his old position at the head of the country’s navy, and the rise of his ally General AntÃ’nio Indjai.

Many analysts have seen in these events the hand of a narcotrafficking mafia eager to prevent any political reform that could lead to repression of their activities and to protect their accomplices within the army and civilian administration. While the influence of narco-trafficking over the current power relations in Guinea-Bissau cannot be doubted, the direct involvement of narco-traffickers in the above crises is still the object of much speculation. Analysts and journalists alike hastily drew on some rumours — for example that the bomb that killed General Tagme Na Wai in March 2009 was made in Thailand, a country known for its involvement in the international drug trade — to draw a link that we should still treat with the greatest caution.

Nonetheless, the events of 2009 and 2010 have come to confirm Guinea-Bissau’s narco-state label in the minds of many international actors. This has had, overall, negative consequences for Guinea-Bissau as the international community has been increasingly reluctant to support a country with such an uncertain political future. Most notably, in 2010 the EU decided to withdraw its initial plans to follow up EUSSR GuineaBissau (a mission in support of security sector reform), with another,similar mission. In reaction to the official appointment of mutiny leaders at the head of the army, the EU subsequently opened an article 96 consultation procedure with Guinea-Bissau, which could eventually lead to a definitive suspension of EU development aid. While there may therefore have been a time when the spotlight drawn on narco-trafficking suited Guinea-Bissau’s political leadership — providing renewed international interest in the small country and averting eyes away from its long-time, unsolved political rivalries — this is hardly the case now, and Guinea-Bissau seems increasingly isolated.

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