Egypt intends to adopt a different approach concerning plans to share the waters of the River Nile, Reem Leila reports Prime Minister Essam Sharaf and the newly appointed Minister of Irrigation and Water Resources Hussein El-Atfi will visit Ethiopia within the next few weeks to start new negotiations with Ethiopian officials over the Entebbe Agreement. The fresh talks will be based on an equitable share distribution of the waters of the River Nile so that all Nile Basin countries benefit without affecting the water share of any. A 40-man delegation comprising politicians, academics, and civil society activists met last week with Ugandan President Yoweri Museveni to discuss the Entebbe treaty signed by most Nile Basin countries. It was the first Egyptian delegation to visit an African country since the revolution which overthrew Hosni Mubarak in February. The discussions concentrated on the view of the new Egyptian administration that focus should be aimed more on African issues, more than what was done in Mubarak's government throughout the past 30 years. There has been serious concern on how to share the Nile waters with the rest of the basin countries lying at the world's longest river. While Uganda is a signatory to the recent Nile Basin agreement, Kampala has not yet ratified it, pending parliament's approval. "Our ratification would wait for the placement of a new administration in Egypt, including the conclusion of presidential and parliamentary elections," announced Museveni to the press. During the talks, Museveni declared that Uganda will not be involved in any policy that would affect Egypt's water security. "We will not ratify in a hurry. We want Egypt on board," said Museveni. "The issue should not be the building of dams. Uganda will go ahead and construct dams for electricity generation at Bujagali, Karuma and elsewhere. The real threat is underdevelopment, deforestation for firewood and farming," he added. Last month Burundi joined other upstream countries and signed an agreement to strip Egypt and Sudan of what the two countries consider their Nile water rights. The countries want to carry irrigation and hydropower projects without first taking Egypt's approval. Egypt and Sudan continue to refuse to take part in talks on the Entebbe agreement. The accord would redistribute the shares of Nile waters, in sharp contrast to the two treaties of 1929 and 1959 which provided both Egypt and Sudan with the lion's share of the Nile waters. Both sides agreed that the solution to preserve natural resources depends on the development of industrialised and service-based economies, from Burundi to Egypt. Diaaeddin El-Qousi, international water expert, described the visit by the Egyptian delegation as a good step towards improving relationships with them. "They have the upper hand now. Although Museveni said he will support Egypt and will try to pressure other upstream countries to slow down the process of ratifying the treaty, he stated at the same time that Egypt should join the treaty," said El-Qousi. According to El-Qousi, the only way out for Egypt is to return to the negotiating table. Egypt consumes 30 million cubic metres a day of the Nile just for drinking. Ethiopia will soon finish building the Tekeze hydroelectric dam which will be the biggest not just in Africa only but in the world at a cost of $360 million. "However, though Ethiopia claims that the dam is to produce electricity, facts and data reveal that the dam's water will irrigate more than 500,000 feddans. This would be disastrous for Egypt," stated El-Qousi. If the Tekeze Dam is constructed, Egypt will lose between 10-15 billion cubic metres of its current 55.5 billion cubic metres of water. El-Qousi was not happy with Egypt's handling of the River Nile portfolio, believing that negotiating personnel should be different from those of the past in order to be accepted by the African countries. He blamed the previous regime for mismanaging the issue but added that the newly adopted policies are also muddled and blurred. "The newly appointed minister of irrigation is asking the help of former minister Mahmoud Abu Zeid who is currently head of the Arabic Water Council. This attitude which the government is adopting will lead the country to a deadlock," said El-Qousi who added that if the issue was not resolved Egypt will have to import 80 per cent of its food instead of the current 50 per cent. The River Nile extends for more than 6,650km and serves 10 Riparian countries. The Nile supports the livelihood of more than 160 million people. Egypt will initiate projects in Uganda, including digging more water wells and establishing more dams to store rain water and cleansing the Great Lakes at a cost of LE75 million. Ibrahim Nasreddin, head of the Centre for African Studies and Research, pointed to the fractured relationship between upstream and downstream countries, especially Egypt. Nasreddin noted that Ethiopia played an antagonistic role, and that irrespective of Egypt's policies "it will be difficult to change this role." Egypt and Sudan recently agreed to revive plans for the construction of the Gongli Canal in South Sudan. The canal would channel swamp water back into the Nile, amounting to an annual increase of Nile water availability of roughly four billion cubic metres. In a press release issued by the Ministry of Irrigation and Water Resources, Minister El-Atfi declared he had requested the help of all related ministries and civil groups. "Egypt is going through a new era that will witness new policies, especially with regard to the Nile Basin countries," said El-Atfi. Mustafa El-Guindi, a member of the 40-man delegation to Uganda and a member of the Wafd Party, noted that the delegation was trying to build on the sympathy Africans expressed towards the Egyptian revolution and to work towards a new beginning. "We will try to visit other Nile Basin countries, but we chose Uganda to start with because it had a serious problem with Egypt's previous regime." According to El-Guindi, the delegation wanted to deliver a message to all African countries: Egypt is no longer represented by Mubarak, who did not bother to visit any of the relevant African countries for the past 25 years, especially after an attempted assassination in Ethiopia in 1995. "We wanted to show them that the spirit of the 25 January Revolution is ruling now."
