APA-Dakar (Senegal) Some 400 participants are expected to attend the 9th edition of the Dakar International Forum on Peace and Security in Africa, which opens on Monday November 27.
At a time when political and security issues in the Sahel are at a crossroads, the Dakar International Forum on Peace and Security returns this year to address a topical issue for the continent. “Africa’s potential and solutions to security challenges and institutional instability” is the general theme chosen for the ninth edition of this annual event, scheduled for November 27 and 28, 2023 at the Abdou Diouf International Conference Center (CICAD) in Diamniadio, located some 30 kilometers from Dakar.
Given that the meeting is “an informal space for strategic reflection” and a privileged framework for analysis of the major trends in Africa in terms of peace, security and development, a number of topics will be addressed by the speakers, including the recent coups d’état in certain West and Central African countries.
The new political-security alliances between certain states in the Sahel region, led by military juntas, not to mention Burkina Faso, Niger and Mali, three countries that recently set up the Alliance of Sahel States (AES) to support each other and fight terrorism, will also be scrutinized by the experts who will be travelling to the Senegalese capital. There will be no fewer than “400 participants, including civilian and military decision-makers, experts and researchers from every continent.”
More generally, however, they will be discussing “security challenges in Africa” and “solutions to institutional instability” on the continent, summarized General Jean Dieme at a briefing for journalists on Friday, director of the Center for Defence and Security Studies (CHEDS), to which the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Senegalese Abroad, the forum’s prime contractor, has entrusted the leadership of the scientific commission since 2016, made up of experts such as the former president of the University of Dakar, Saliou Ndiaye.
“With what we know, we’re going to offer the world our point of view,” said General Dieme, stressing the importance of the media in “storytelling” the African way, in the face of current geopolitical changes in the world. He reminds the audience that “all solutions will be discussed and recommendations made” on the themes chosen for this meeting, which concern the continent’s security and development.
However, “our vocation is not to impose resolutions or solutions on anyone,” he stressed, pointing out that “the principle of the forum is freedom of expression.” In keeping with this logic, the doors of this “international agora” are also open to African countries currently administered by military juntas. Experts from such countries as Burkina Faso will be among the panelists, says the CHEDS director.
In 2022, the eighth edition of the Dakar International Forum provided a diagnosis of exogenous shocks in the face of challenges to Africa’s stability and sovereignty, as well as a forward-looking analysis of a resilient Africa, say the organizers, who this year hope to “mobilize and enhance” human resources and “propose African solutions” to the continent’s security challenges and institutional instability.
ODL/ac/fss/abj/APA