African Great Lakes Region

Graham P Jones Excerpts

Thursday 12th January 2017 Commons Chamber

[Graham Jones (Hyndburn) (Lab)]

I thank my hon. Friend the Member for Bassetlaw (John Mann) for securing this important debate.

I want to focus on eastern Democratic Republic of the Congo, because it is an area that has been overlooked by this place, the west and the whole world. Obviously, stability and security in the great lakes region of Africa is too often overlooked by the international community. That applies particularly to the eastern DRC but throughout the region. Violence, rape and displacement have become normalised, while several of the region’s countries have become bywords for conflict and human rights abuses. Over 1,000 Congolese women are raped every day. It seems uniquely shocking when we talk about it, but then there seems to be a transformation in our minds, and we think, “Well, it is tragically commonplace”, and we just seem to accept it. That is a really sad reflection.

The result is a relative lack of awareness of and action against the political instability that has beset these countries for decades. Worse still, there is a tendency to regard the violence as perpetual and inevitable, in contrast to conflicts in other parts of the world, which seem more immediately redeemable and on which we seem to be more focused. The ongoing refugee crisis in Europe and the Mediterranean is testament to this trend, as is Syria. The Calais “Jungle”, for example, received a huge amount of coverage and activism, compared to the refugees of eastern DRC and Burundi, and yet the Calais refugees, as tragic as their plight was, numbered just 7,000, compared with the millions of internally displaced persons in Burundi, eastern DRC and DRC more widely who have been displaced for decades—not months or a year but decades. Worse still, millions of refugees torn from their families, homes and communities have been forced to live in east African refugee camps for about 20 years. It is a shame that so little attention is paid to this issue.

Having visited Rwanda twice in the past few years and spoken to Congolese refugees who have been accommodated there, I have some tentative reflections on the issue. Rwanda seems to be a developed country and a relatively stable and increasingly prosperous democracy, whereas the DRC continues to be plagued by anarchic and systemic violence. According to recent UN statistics, there are currently 2.7 million internally displaced people, as well as 430,000 refugees displaced from the eastern DRC, spread in camps across Burundi, Rwanda, Uganda and Tanzania—nearly half a million people whom we seem to ignore when we talk about human rights and helping people.

On my first visit to one of the camps at Byumba, I witnessed at first hand the conditions in which families, often spanning three generations—can Members believe that?—have had to live. Located at the very top of a lowly mountain range, isolated from the attention of the world, the Gihembe refugee camp houses some 15,000 people. It has been there since the 1990s. It is overcrowded, lacking in resources and cramped. The shacks and primitive accommodation are crowded together on the steep slopes, and inside the camp there is an inadequate supply of water, electricity and food. Children aged under 18 represent a staggering 51.2% of the camp’s population, and because they have grown up in these camps, they know nothing else. This is the world in which they live, which our world does not seem to understand or even care about. Poor education and insufficient public amenities abound.

The situation in the DRC makes it almost impossible for refugees to return home. More than 100 armed militia groups camped out in its impenetrable jungles continue to kill and terrorise families daily, and rape continues to be used as a weapon of war. I hope that the issue will be raised in the Chamber again and again in the future, because we should not turn our back on it. When the conflict worsens, more than 400,000 women can be raped in a year.

The eastern DRC is plagued by murderous militia groups, from the Ugandan Allied Democratic Forces to the Democratic Forces for the Liberation of Rwanda, which exploit the country’s mineral wealth and use its proceeds to terrorise communities into subordination. The state is at best ineffectual, and at worst complicit. Congolese politicians enable the groups to control and compete for vast swathes of the DRC in order to maintain their cut and their hold on power. They are allowed to descend into mindless violence in pursuit of an industry worth $27 trillion in untapped mineral resources in the DRC, fighting for control over coltan production and the DRC’s vast gold, tin and tungsten reserves. Fighting frequently breaks out to determine which groups control the lucrative mines in the eastern areas of the country, and the situation shows little sign of improving.

With little or no hope of return, Congolese refugees are trapped in the camps, as they have been for a long time. Unlike those in Calais, they are not provided with comprehensive rights in their new country. Tanzania and Uganda have restricted the legal right of refugees to work, while Burundi and Malawi have restricted access to citizenship. Zambia has even restricted access to education.

We in this place need to ask why this situation continues with no end in sight. The Minister will undoubtedly point to the efforts of the Catholic Church, the African Union and MONUSCO to broker a lasting peace, but we need to ask why the actions of MONUSCO, the largest UN peacekeeping force to be sent to the eastern DRC, have failed to stabilise the area—and now that force is being withdrawn. No inquiry seems to be taking place into the failure and the ongoing violence. Stabilisation would enable the refugees to return home and conduct their lives without the constant fear of violence and unending poverty.

An attitudes survey carried out by the South African Sonke Gender Justice Network in 2012 showed a shocking prevalence of the acceptance of rape among Congolese men. One in three men in the eastern DRC admitted to committing sexual assault, while 61% of interviewees stated that women sometimes deserved to be beaten. The DRC has been branded the “rape capital of the world”, and I hope that we will address that in future debates.

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[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs (Mr Tobias Ellwood)]

It is a pleasure to respond to this debate. Although many of the same characters are here from the previous debate, I suspect that the tone will be slightly different. It is a pleasure to respond to a subject on which there is a lot of cross-party agreement. Many of today’s questions relate to our international aid commitments, but I will do my best to answer them. I congratulate the hon. Member for Bassetlaw (John Mann) on securing this debate. He asked a series of pertinent questions, and I will endeavour to write to him and to other Members if I do not get the opportunity to answer them or to pay tribute to the work that is being done.

Many important points have been made. Let me begin by saying that the great lakes has long been a troubled region, and that remains the case today. It faces many challenges: challenges to democracy when those in power seek to hold on to it; challenges to livelihoods; challenges to human rights from armed groups and repressive Governments; and challenges to survival from violence and hunger.

It is also a region of great potential. The rapid development in Rwanda, which I have visited a number of times, is testimony to that. It also shows what can be achieved when regional Governments and the international community work together.

The UK is a major partner for the region, which is why it was part of my first visit to the continent, following my appointment in July as Minister for Africa. The UK is the second largest donor of humanitarian and development aid. We continue to play a key role in promoting sustainable peace and stability. The people of the great lakes region are resilient, and our aim is to work with Governments and the people of the great lakes countries to achieve a more peaceful, better governed, more democratic and more prosperous region.

Before going into the details of the main countries, I shall respond to some of the points that have been made. The hon. Member for Bassetlaw, who introduced the debate, talked about conflict minerals. I can assure him that we take the matter seriously. The Serious Fraud Office is looking into some investigations that are linked to British companies. Again, I can write to him with further details.

I think the hon. Gentleman was the only Member to refer to the illegal wildlife trade. We place importance on that matter and the Foreign Secretary takes it very seriously indeed. He is working with the Environment Secretary, who attended the illegal wildlife conference in Vietnam in November. We offered to host the next event, which will take place in London, as the hon. Gentleman mentioned, in 2018. The Foreign Secretary’s father is very engaged in the matter as well.

Mention was also made of the power that the monarchy can bring to bear. Prince William is a huge driver in raising the profile of this matter and in increasing the understanding of the work that we have done. On a visit to Uganda, I was able to see some of the Department for International Development programmes that are in place, which are providing better intelligence to enable us to understand criminal gangs. Those gangs have no regard for borders. They are moving the ivory and so forth across those borders—looking for markets, getting through customs illegally—and on, predominantly, to the far east, which is the biggest market. That is why the hosting of the event in Vietnam was important in respect of people in the region acknowledging that more needs to be done in that neck of the woods.

The hon. Gentleman also mentioned the Republic of the Congo. I had the experience of crossing the mighty Congo river, in a very small boat, from Kinshasa to Brazzaville. I also had the opportunity to meet the President there, who is absolutely committed to the areas of work that we want to do.

Furthermore, there is more engagement and involvement in honouring the constitution in the Democratic Republic of the Congo: with 80 million people, what happens there can have a spillover effect into Angola and elsewhere, so it is very important that we ensure that there is stability in that part of Africa.

My hon. Friend the Member for Stafford (Jeremy Lefroy), whom I have long known, is an advocate and supporter of and expert on Africa. He made a powerful speech. He knows that my interest in Africa is personal, and we have a connection by way of the fact that my sister was headteacher of the international school at the base of Kilimanjaro, in Moshi. Through that, we recognised our mutual interest in Africa.

The fact that my hon. Friend says he is positive about the region, given the amount of knowledge he has, fills me with a sense of promise that we are going in the right direction. I join him in paying tribute to Tom Perriello, although I have no idea what the American envoy to the great lakes region will do next, as changes are taking place.

I join my hon. Friend in paying tribute to the work done by the Catholic Church to broker the deal, which is so important. I will come to that in a moment. I also pay tribute to the Tanzanians and Ugandans for the work that they have done in looking after so many refugees who have been caught up in the region.

The hon. Member for Hyndburn (Graham Jones)—who, I am pleased to say, has remained stationary since he was last referred to—mentioned the refugee crisis. We should not forget that while we discuss refugee issues relating to Libya, the Mediterranean, the shores of Turkey and Greece, and countries right across Europe, the source of many of those problems is the instability in the heart of Africa. Get the source right and those people will not feel the need to make that terrible journey across Africa to seek a life in Europe.

The hon. Member for Glasgow North East (Anne McLaughlin) made a powerful contribution, as she does on such matters. She reminded us, perhaps less delicately than I would have put it, about our historical colonial links to the country. We cannot deny our history. We have to recognise the role that we have played in the vast continent, but we can use that to our advantage by saying that there is a desire for us to continue our engagement, now working with the countries in the region in a positive way to meet some of the challenges faced today.

The hon. Member for Liverpool, West Derby (Stephen Twigg) mentioned the challenges of the DRC and the number of people that are displaced there. I pay tribute to the work that he and his Committee, which others have mentioned, are doing to focus on the issue. He spoke about the humanitarian crisis there that is shaping the wider conflict. He also touched on something that is so important and that was not yet apparent to me when I visited the DRC. There is vast criminality, particularly in the east of the country, but extremism has yet to set foot there. However, that is exactly where it could go to next, in the same way in which we have seen Boko Haram take advantage of the absence of government in Nigeria and al-Shabaab take advantage of the absence of governance in the southern neck of Somalia. That is why it is so important that we get it right in the east of the DRC.

The hon. Member for Glasgow North (Patrick Grady) made an important point that the many millions of people affected by conflict are those who have not caused it at all. They are in a limited position to influence what is going on, yet they are the ones harmed by the conflict. However, the conflicts and problems are man-made, so they should be solvable. He was the only Member to touch on the issue of climate change. We should not forget that climate change is affecting the ability to grow crops. If it becomes too hot to be able to do so, people will have to move, so migration will be a consequence. He asked me to reiterate our 0.7% international aid commitment. I absolutely stand by it. I would hate to see a Government of any hue challenging our 0.7% commitment, which allows us to stand up with some authority at the United Nations and to call on other countries to do things, act and follow us. I hope that all parties will continue in that vein. The more we make noises about it, the less anybody at the Treasury can sneak anything through on the quiet. We are all in agreement on that.

The hon. Member for Heywood and Middleton (Liz McInnes), the Labour spokesperson, mentioned the challenge and failure to honour constitutions across Africa. I am afraid this is something that we all need to work on. As the mother of all Parliament and a country that supports the idea of democracy, the programmes that we support with that 0.7% must not simply be about infrastructure, or working with NGOs and groups that need support, although that is important. It is also about improving governance, decision making and democratic processes so that when the terms of people such as President Kabila end, they stand down. There is nothing to stop President Kabila in the DRC from standing again in five years’ time, if he wishes to. Such people should not be able to continue on or to tweak and play around with the constitution. We do not want to see that.

The hon. Lady talked about the role of the ICC. I am afraid that there is an issue with a number of African countries choosing to step away from it to protect those who may be up for charge. We are working with our colleagues in the ICC to prevent that from happening further.

I will talk about the countries in a little more detail in the time I have remaining. In the DRC, President Kabila’s mandate ended on 19 December, as hon. Members have reflected. No elections have taken place, yet he remains in power. When I visited last year, I made the point that the UK was deeply disappointed that elections did not take place in 2016 as planned. I do not know whether hon. Members are aware of what happened. The opposition in the DRC also did not want elections to take place because the electoral commission had not upgraded the electoral roll, meaning that many 18-year-olds were not on the roll. There was a disjoint in where things would go and who should be in charge. Thankfully, the new electoral roll is being mapped out—it requires a census—so we are finally moving forward.

The unexpected good news came on 31 December, when talks mediated by the Catholic bishops hon. Members have paid tribute to reached a deal between the opposition and the Government. I join others in paying tribute to the bishops’ work—the fact that they have done that work there means there may be demand for them in other parts of Africa as well. They have achieved what few thought possible: an inclusive deal that, if implemented, will secure the DRC’s first democratic transition of power since independence. I hope to visit the country in the near future to underline Britain’s commitment and to enforce the point that that process must continue.

The two key points in the deal were, first, that assurances were given by the Government that Kabila will step down and elections will be held by the end of this year and, secondly, that the current Prime Minister must be replaced by someone from the opposition majority.

As hon. Members have mentioned, armed groups in the eastern DRC are causing problems in terms of the security situation. We need to work with the United Nations to make sure that the commitment to stability in the east continues.

[Graham Jones]

I want to ask about the situation regarding MONUSCO. There seems to be a failure to resolve the violence. MONUSCO is the biggest UN peacekeeping operation that has ever been undertaken, yet it appears to be a failure.

[Mr Ellwood]

I raised the point of what more we could do from the international development perspective. Half the problem is actually getting access to remote areas. The roads are extremely poor. A journey from one community to another, which we would normally expect to take 20 minutes, takes seven or eight hours, which is a perfect situation for criminals and insurgents to operate in and perfect for the instability we are seeing. I suggested to the deputy head of the United Nations Development Programme that more effort—this is something the hon. Gentleman may wish to take up—should perhaps be placed within the DFID budget on improving the infrastructure as well, to allow the security forces to get deeper into these areas to provide the security we need. [Interruption.]

It looks like I have one minute left. I have made comments on the other countries, but I will write to hon. Members to clarify where we stand and to underline our commitment. However, let me go back to the beginning and say thank you to the hon. Member for Bassetlaw and, indeed, to the Backbench Business Committee for allowing this debate to take place.

The Government share the grave concerns aired by hon. Members about the continuing violence, the human rights violations and the repression of civil and political rights across the various parts of the great lakes region. I wish to assure hon. Members of the UK’s unwavering commitment to the people of the region. They want and deserve peace, democracy and hope for the future, and we will continue to work hard with regional Governments and the wider international community to make those aspirations a reality.