Peace Negotiations : Bernt Aasen

Operation Lifeline Sudan (OLS), 2002-2005

Bernt Aasen and Dr. John

By Bernt Aasen

Introduction

OLS had started up in 1989 as a humanitarian program, based on a tripartite agreement between the UN, the Government of Sudan (GoS) and the Sudan People’s Liberation Movement (SPLM) and Army (SPLA). It had a Southern Sector (SS) managed from Nairobi and Lokichogio in Kenya servicing areas controlled by SPLA and a Northern Sector (NS) run from Khartoum, which covered the north and towns in the south controlled by GoS. The Southern Sector was headed by the UNICEF OLS Chief who also was UN Deputy Humanitarian Coordinator for the South.

With Amb. Vraalsen, UN Special Envoy,
and Dr. John in his meeting room at New Site.

By 2002, the Southern Sector was an oiled humanitarian aid machinery which included the UN, predominately UNICEF and WFP, and some 30 international NGOs with more than 600 staff in sub-offices and camps in SPLA controlled territories. No NGOs were involved in the NS and UN agencies, including UNICEF, provided their support to GoS, through regular Country Programs. OLS NS was, at the time, limited to provide humanitarian aid in Internally Displaced People camps around Khartoum and, later, used as a framework for support to communities in Darfur where a genocide was about to unfold.

OLS had been controversial from the beginning. It was the first UN signed agreement for delivering humanitarian aid with an armed non-state entity. Breaking new grounds and for various reasons, it was an easy target for criticism - by Member States because of politics and by humanitarians and development experts because of the imperfect work done by OLS.

This article is about the importance of learning from past experiences to get better at delivering humanitarian aid.

Positioning and new initiatives

with Gov. Commander Malik in his office

After decades of warfare and failed peace negotiations, in July 2002, GoS and SPLM/A signed the Machacos Protocols. The Protocols brought hope to the peace process sponsored by IGAD (Intergovernmental Authority on Development) an eight-country economic bloc including Sudan and which, eventually, turned out to be the basic building block for the later Comprehensive Peace Agreement (CPA).

For quite some time OLS SS had been under tough criticism from GoS and some other Member States for not sticking to the agreed, initial humanitarian aid agenda, but getting increasingly involved in financing development projects. Nevertheless, with the Machacos Protocols and peace in sight, OLS SS redefined its objectives and aims. In addition to provide humanitarian aid to people in need, OLS SS set an ambitious agenda for becoming a promotor of peace between GoS and SPLM/A as well as among peoples in South Sudan. Obviously, this aim was way beyond the initial agreements for OLS. When GoS, other Member States and voices within UN turned up the volume criticizing OLS SS for over-stepping its mandate, they were right - but the context was evolving. After consultations with Kofi Annan’s Special Envoy to Sudan, Ambassador Tom Vraalsen, UN Humanitarian Coordinator in Khartoum, Mukesh Kapila, and IGAD’s Chief mediator, General Lazarus Sumbeiywo, as well as the “Troika” (USA, UK and Norway, which were facilitating the peace negotiations), OLS launched two additional program components: A Capacity Building Trust Fund (CBTF) and a community based Quick Impact Peace Dividend Projects (QIPDP).

The CBTF was intended to cover the SPLM and, particularly, OLS SS’ direct counterpart, the Sudan Relief and Rehabilitation Agency (SRRA), administrative costs, and train staff and build capacity during the transition for a new governmental structure for southern Sudan.

With the team in Rubek Camp

QIPDP was to generate visible benefits of peace through small-scale infrastructure projects implemented by the communities themselves; repair a school or health center, build a bridge, or repair a road. The basic idea was to get cash for local projects out to villages with a minimum of paperwork and build popular support for  the peace negotiations.

Parts of GoS and other Member States which believed SPLA should be defeated through military force, also criticized OLS SS for legitimizing an armed non-state rebel group and giving them diplomatic status. Again, to a certain point, they were right. OLS SS signed agreements and negotiated access for humanitarian aid with SPLM/SRRA as if they already were a government for territories in southern Sudan. Indeed, they were the de facto power-structure in control of areas with 10-12 million inhabitants and OLS SS had more than 600 staff on the ground in some 30 different camps. It needed “Ground Rules” for respecting its presence and ensuring the safety of staff. When threatened by military activity, OLS SS depended upon collaboration from SPLM/A for timely evacuation of field staff. At the time, full evacuation of camps in southern Sudan was a weekly exercise for OLS SS.

A point of criticism much discussed among UN agencies were the accusations from GoS that OLS SS accepted aid being diverted to support the soldiers of SPLA. Probably, at times, aid was diverted. When it was too dangerous for WFP to be on the ground, frequently, food was dropped from airplanes. In these situations, obviously, some sacks of rice and beans could well have ended up in the hands of SPLA. Likewise, it was impossible for UNICEF to avoid SPLA soldiers fetching water from the wells it drilled for civilians to survive.

Shortcomings

While OLS SS, probably, got the political positioning and new program initiatives right, the criticism by humanitarian - and development experts of its way of doing business, should have been accepted and lead to corrective actions:

OLS were not able to measure the impact of the humanitarian aid it delivered. Reporting was limited to input indicators; number of tons of food delivered, number of wells drilled, number of schoolbooks distributed, number of teachers trained.

Aid was delivered directly by UN agencies and International NGOs and not through local organizations. Sudanese organizations were seen as representing fiduciary risks, the efforts for “localization” of the operation were at a minimum.

OLS delivered aid to the populations in areas where they successfully had negotiated access and not, necessarily, to the most vulnerable and most in need. For political reasons, peoples in areas like Nuba Mountains and Southern Blue Nile remained mostly unattended to.

OLS did not involve beneficiaries in the planning of programs and had no feedback-loop for comments and complains from those who were supposed to receive aid (a concept later known as Accountability to Affected Population).

Interestingly and most worrisome, in 2020, UNICEF Humanitarian Review concluded that the shortcomings pointed out in OLS SS’ way of doing business, were still common weaknesses in the organization’s Humanitarian Action around the world. Unfortunately, it can be concluded that UNICEF’s capacity to write “Lessons Learned” is much more developed than its ability to implement them.

The end

The peace negotiations between GoS and SPLM made landmark progress with the parties agreeing to the “Naivasha protocols” in May 2004, with the official signatures in Nairobi, the month after. The CPA was signed in January 2005 and six months later, Dr. John Garang, the Chairman of SPLM/A, took oath in Khartoum as First Vice-President of Sudan and President of South Sudan. With the future of Sudan looking bright, the days of OLS were about to come to an end.

Dr. John Garang had been the leader of SPLA/M for 20 years. He was the mastermind who had successfully managed ethnic tensions among peoples in the south and negotiated peace with the north. When just a month later, 31 July, Dr. John Garang died in a helicopter crash, the uncertainties around the future were back.

Launching the Quick Imact Peace Dividend
Project in Rumbek HQs of SRRA. John Marks
of USAID making his speech.

Due to cooperation and pressure from the international community, the CPA survived and through a referendum in 2011, 98% of the voters in the southern Sudan went for secession and the world had a new country, South Sudan.

At the 10th anniversary of South Sudan as an independent country, President Salva Kiir and his international partners do not have much to celebrate. Due to internal political conflicts, ethnic violence, rampant corruption and famines, South Sudan stands 3rd to last on the global Human Development Index. According to UNICEF’s Office in Juba, there are more children in need of urgent humanitarian aid this year than ever before.

For 40 years, aid to the peoples of southern Sudan has been a UNICEF priority. Probably, it’s time to deliver aid as recommended by the recent Humanitarian Review. Or, maybe what is needed, is something totally different?

Security Officer, Royston "Shiner" Wright
traveling with me to Rumbek.

Literature for further reading:

• God, Oil & Country, Changing the logic of War in Sudan, ICG, 2002.
• The Mediator, General Lazaro Sumbeiywo and the Southern Sudan Peace Process, Waithaka Waithenyg, 2007.
• Waging peace in Sudan, Hilde F. Frafjord, 2011.
• Against the tide of evil, Mukesh Kapila, 2014.
• Looking back to look ahead? Reviewing key lessons from Operation Lifeline Sudan and past humanitarian operations in South Sudan. Feinstein International Center, 2014.
• Who killed Dr. John Garang? PaanLuel Wel, 2020.
• Strengthening UNICEF’s Humanitarian Action, B. Aasen, S. Lauwerier, H. Curwen, F. Cave, UNICEF, 2020

About the author:

Bernt Aasen joined UNICEF in 1987. From September 2002 to November 2004, he was Chief of OLS, UN Deputy Humanitarian Coordinator Southern Sector and UN observer to the IGAD sponsored peace negotiations. Later, he held positions as Chief of Staff, Office of Executive Director, NYHQs and Regional Director, LACRO. He retired in 2016. In 2019, he was brought back as a consultant leading the team carrying out the Humanitarian Review.

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