A F R I C A W A T C H

 

PEACEKEEPING

Promoting Angolan peace, UN envoy Beye dies in crash

UN Special Representative in Angola Alioune Blondin Beye and seven of his colleagues were killed on 25 June 1998 when their aircraft crashed in Côte d'Ivoire. Mr. Beye, a "dedicated and dynamic peacemaker," as UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan called him, was on one of his many diplomatic missions to seek support for the Angolan peace process.

Alioune Blondin Beye
A barrister and expert in international law, Mr. Beye served as foreign minister of Mali in 1978-86 and as a senior official at the African Development Bank, before being named Special Representative in Angola. At the time of his arrival there in June 1993, the country was in the midst of a renewed civil war between the government and the UNITA rebel movement, following the failure of previous settlement attempts. Mr. Beye persuaded the two sides to resume talks, and after nearly a year of difficult negotiations, they signed the Lusaka Protocol in November 1994. Despite some progress toward demobilization, implementation of the accord has been slow and rocky, with Mr. Beye constantly urging the protagonists to carry through on their agreement.

At a memorial service in New York for Mr. Beye and his team, the UN Secretary-General paid homage to "colleagues fallen in the cause of peace" and hoped that Angola would one day be united and at peace, so that their deaths would not be in vain. Killed with Mr. Beye were: Mr. Koffi Adjoyi from Togo, Mr. Beandegar Dessande from Chad, Mr. Amadou Moctar Gueye from Senegal, Mr. Ibikunle Williams from Nigeria, Mr. Alvaro Costa from Portugal, and their pilots, Mr. Jason Hunter and Mr. Andrew McCurrach, from South Africa.

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Strong African economic growth forecast for 1998

Africa's gross domestic product (GDP) will likely grow between 4 and 5 per cent this year, after 2.9 per cent last year, according to a report by the UN Economic Commission for Africa (ECA). The higher forecast is based on the assumption that good weather will prevail and that world market prices for Africa's key exports will improve. The lower forecast assumes that only one of those two factors will materialize, says the ECA's annual Survey of the Economic and Social Situation in Africa, 1997, of which a summary was released in April. Since the impact of the El Niño weather phenomenon has largely passed, the ECA expects weather conditions in 1998 to be more favourable than last year, contributing to a 7 per cent growth in agricultural output.

El Niño had a negative impact on agricultural production in 1997, which grew only 1.7 per cent, compared with 5.2 per cent in 1996. Combined with other trends, this held back the overall GDP growth rate for the continent to only 2.9 per cent in 1997, down from 4 per cent the year before. Growth in manufacturing value added remained the same in 1997 as in 1996 (2.5 per cent), while growth in mining declined from 6.5 per cent to 3.8 per cent. The value of African exports increased by 5.9 per cent, with an 8 per cent growth in volume; but the main benefits flowed to oil-exporting countries, which attained a $32.9 bn trade surplus in 1997, while non-oil countries suffered a $24.6 bn deficit.

By subregion, the highest GDP growth rates were in Central Africa (3.8 per cent), West Africa (3.7 per cent) and East Africa (3.5 per cent). The lowest was in Southern Africa, at 2.4 per cent. Growth in North Africa was 2.8 per cent, close to the continental average, but since North Africa's 1996 growth was 4.4 per cent, this reflected the biggest slowdown for any subregion in Africa.

APPOINTMENTS

Secretary-General Kofi Annan has appointed Mr. Thandika Mkandawire as Director of the Geneva-based UN Research Institute for Social Development. A Swedish national of Malawian origin, Mr. Mkandawire was formerly (1986-96) Executive Secretary of the Council for the Development of Social Science Research in Africa (CODESRIA), headquartered in Dakar. At the time of his new appointment, he was Senior Research Fellow at the Centre for Development Research in Copenhagen.

Chile's Permanent Representative to the United Nations, Ambassador Juan Somavia, has been elected as the next Director-General of the International Labour Organization, with effect from March 1999. Ambassador Somavia was Chairman of the Preparatory Committee of the 1995 World Summit for Social Development, and has also served (currently and in 1993-95) as President of the UN Economic and Social Council.

Secretary-General Kofi Annan has designated Norway's Ambassador to the U.S. Tom Eric Vraalsen as his Special Envoy for Humanitarian Affairs for the Sudan. Ambassador Vraalsen, who will continue to represent his country in Washington, was formerly Norway's Permanent Representative to the UN (1982-89) and Minister of Development Cooperation (1989-90).

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