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The coup in Niger is just the latest, and probably not the last. Across the Sahel, African nations are falling to military dictatorships.
Are these incidents separate crises, or part of something larger? The fact that few are acknowledging is that Niger's coup, like those in neighbouring countries, is a "climate coup"—a crisis born of climate impacts largely ignored by the international community.
And the sudden military takeover is a boon for jihadists who will exploit rising instability across the Sahel.
As a Gambian Parliamentarian who witnessed the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS)'s intervention in my country in 2017, I know that military intervention in Niger is unlikely to solve the crisis. In the Gambia, ECOWAS managed to restore democracy without resorting to bloodshed. But what happened in 2017 cannot be repeated in one-size-fits-all fashion.
An ECOWAS intervention is likely to Niger not only destabilise an already fragile region struggling to contain the rise of Islamist extremists, it will fail to address the root causes—an omission that will empower extremists like never before.
And while Western academics in their ivory towers disagree over whether Sahel conflicts are due to climate change, we on the ground know the facts.
In two decades, Niger has suffered nine droughts and five floods, destroying its rural heartlands. Water shortages trigger a food crisis every four years. As a recent International Monetary Fund study revealed, decades of climate change in Niger are behind food shocks driving devastating levels of rural poverty.
Combined with rapid population growth, mounting economic dissatisfaction, weak governance, and scant services, these conditions create a perfect storm for extremism to flourish. Conflicts over land and resources become normal. Those with greater firepower use it to their advantage.
Is the resulting violence due to climate change, or is it due to poverty, tribal tensions, or failing political institutions? This is an irrelevant question based on false premises. It is all of these. That's why a landmark study last year by a group of African scholars called the string of conflicts across the Sahel a form of "eco violence", involving environmental, social, and political failures.
According to the Institute for Economics and Peace, the Sahel is one of three ecological hotspots "particularly susceptible to collapse." A second hotspot is in the southern African belt from Angola to Madagascar.
That's why I believe it's right to call what has happened in Niger a "climate coup." From the Sahara, Darfur, and across Africa, climate change is trapping African communities into devastating feedback loops of violence, corruption, and displacement, making Niger's "climate coup" a sign of things to come.
United Nations officials are aware that the decades-long lack of financing to help Sahel countries adapt to the climate crisis, stymied by bureaucracy, flawed accounting, and debt has facilitated the wave of violence behind coups in Mali, Burkina Faso, and now Niger.
Of course, denying the critical role of climate change in escalating the dire conditions of deprivation on the continent offers a convenient excuse. It means there's someone else to blame: the peculiarities of African history, tribal differences, political wrangling, and anything else under the sun.
Although Africa contributes just 3.8 percent of global carbon emissions, we are paying the price for the world's largest carbon polluters in the United States, Europe, China, and beyond.
That's why I view the relentless Western skepticism about the upcoming COP28 climate summit hosted by the United Arab Emirates with skepticism of my own.
Previous UN climate summits, including those hosted by Western countries, have struggled to secure and deliver on climate financing pledges. And the $100 billion target promised three years ago—widely criticized for experts for being a fraction of what's needed—has been missed.
For the first time, the presidency of the upcoming COP is taking this blockage seriously. The UAE's convening of a high-level panel dedicated to reforming international financial systems to rapidly deliver adequate climate financing is a milestone. So, too, is the COP28 president's support for a plan to unleash up to $1 trillion to support poorer countries.
If successful, these initiatives could save countless lives across Africa.
But perhaps the most consequential is the COP28 presidency's efforts in recent months at the UN Security Council to get the Council to integrate climate change into policymaking around security, peace, and conflict at the highest levels. Unsurprisingly, this is being especially resisted by major carbon polluters like China and Russia, who are eager to benefit from the decline in Western influence in West Africa.
That's why I believe that world leaders should use the upcoming COP summit to move toward global agreements on both climate security and finance. Ultimately, the escalating crisis in Niger is living, terrifying proof that these issues—development finance, climate mitigation, national security—are not separate. Whatever its flaws, this year's COP is an opportunity to completely rethink the current approach.
Only a total paradigm shift in climate financing, rooted in a holistic approach to climate security, can unlock the funds Africa so desperately needs—not just to protect millions of vulnerable people, but for a future of resilience and sustainability for the Sahel people.
Abdoulie Ceesay is the Deputy Majority Leader of the National Assembly of The Gambia and will representing the Gambian Government at COP28.
The views expressed in this article are the writer's own.
