Name? Stergomena Tax
Westphalian identity? Tanzanian
Age? 60
Why is she in the news? Stergomena Tax is the Executive Secretary of the Southern African Development Community (SADC) which has just announced the deployment of its forces to Mozambique to support combating terrorism and acts of violent extremism in Cabo Delgado.
Why do we care? The main driver behind the violence in the north of Mozambique is the militant Islamist group Ansar al-Sunna. The group is responsible for an escalating conflict that has, over the past three-and-a-half years, killed nearly 3,000 people and displaced almost 800,000.
Why should you care? If the world community on a policy level does not care, then you should at least. To give you an idea of how much the world cares about this problem, Portugal (former Colonizer) has offered to send 60 military instructors to train Mozambique’s troops…Those will surely make a difference… You should care more than the world of international policy makers and therefore 8/10.
Who else cares? Mozambique President Filipe Nyusi. He has historically been resistant to foreign boots on the ground yet even he realised that the military of Mozambique is not equipped enough nor trained enough to face the militia on their own. Since 2017, the attacks have increased both in numbers and in sophistication changing Nyusi’s mind as he agreed to Tax*s proposal.
Any further comments? We usually prefer regional organisations to intervene over international organisations. Everybody’s darling, ECOWAS, is a great example for having successfully restored Democracy in The Gambia in 2016. We can only hope that SADC will be successful and that money won’t run out before the operation is finalised. In the end, all countries involved have been hit rather hard economically by Covid19, making it particularly difficult to ensure funding for the mission. Tax’s main task over the next few months will be to keep all nations onboard and potentially find alternative sources of investment.
