Close to where the Blue Nile enters Sudan, Ethiopia is building the Grand Ethiopian Renaissance Dam, or GERD. As the name implies, the nation hopes the megaproject will help end decades of political, economic, and social instability.
However, as Ethiopia begins unilaterally filling the dam without an agreement with Egypt and Sudan on how to mitigate GERD's risks for those countries, the United States and the international community must ensure Ethiopia’s rebirth doesn't cost lives and livelihoods downstream.
No one begrudges Ethiopia’s right to develop. GERD would bring power to millions of Ethiopians, and other Africans besides. It would regulate the Nile’s flow and reduce the amount of silt taxing dams downstream in Sudan and Egypt.
Moreover, the Dam is a huge source of pride for Ethiopians, who even helped crowdfund its construction. Pop stars sing about it, and social media is plastered with posts from home and the diaspora proclaiming GERD as Ethiopia’s salvation.
This is all well and good. Everyone wants prosperity for Ethiopia. What is good for Ethiopia is good for the Horn of Africa, North Africa, and East Africa. But this is also the point.
Ethiopia is not building GERD in a vacuum. Downstream, millions of Egyptians live on a hydrological knife's edge, dependent on the Nile for everything from drinking to irrigating Egypt’s paltry 6% of livable land. Unsurprisingly, Egypt has been expressing concerns for a decade on how fast Ethiopia would fill the dam and how it will manage water levels afterwards.
Ethiopia wants to fill GERD quickly, then produce as much power as possible for local consumption and export. This means holding back as much water as possible in the reservoir to keep the turbines running at full speed.
Egypt and Sudan want a binding agreement with a mechanism for coordination on how much water is held back over the long term, and especially during times of drought. That way, Ethiopia can produce as much power as it needs, but without impacting water levels downstream.
It’s a simple request.
Yet, despite years of so far fruitless negotiations, Ethiopia has adopted a posture of “you're just going to need to trust us.” Instead of an agreement, Ethiopia has insisted on suggested “guidelines.” Instead of a mechanism for coordination, Ethiopia wants to simply notify the other countries annually of how it plans to operate the dam that year.
They have refused to cooperate with any objective third-party analysis of downstream impacts, ignored international principles around the "equitable and reasonable" use of water resources, and rejected proposals to have neutral observers at the table.
When the United States convened the parties to sign an agreement earlier this year, Addis Ababa scuttled the talks, alleging Washington (Ethiopia’s most stalwart ally) was engaging in colonial behavior.
And now, as Ethiopia is unilaterally filling GERD’s reservoir, it’s still throwing wrenches in the talks. It aims for a fait accompli, while the world is distracted by everything else happening.
Fortunately, the United States has finally taken some tangible actions to pressure Ethiopia to negotiate in good faith, starting by withholding $100 million in aid. It is a start, but pressure by the United States and the international community should continue. So that GERD never turns into a weapon to be used against Egypt or Sudan, there must be a verification mechanism agreed to and enforced by international law. Trust won't be enough.
The jingoism and nationalism expressed about GERD by officials in Addis Ababa, Ethiopian social media, and pop culture, is not the stuff trust is built on. Between statements by the foreign minister that the “Nile is ours,” and social media posts calling for a new Adwa, GERD is being presented as a weapon aimed at Ethiopia’s adversaries, to be wielded as part of its policy of “Water Hegemony.”
Further, who are downstream countries supposed to trust in Ethiopia? Over the past year, ethnic tensions in Ethiopia have returned to the fore - resulting in millions of internal refugees. In fact, Ethiopia may be on the way to serious ethnic conflict. Who can guarantee that GERD won't become a pawn in a civil war? Should Cairo panic every time there is a tight election or a crisis in Addis Ababa?
Finally, no country, especially one like Egypt that is so dependent on one source of water, should be expected to accept a situation where its existence is contingent on the whims of another country. When the USSR placed nuclear weapons in Cuba, America nearly took the world to war. The GERD is the riparian equivalent of those missiles - shut the taps, and end two countries.
This is why GERD’s water levels cannot be left to trust. An internationally recognized and enforced agreement is the only way to resolve this crisis to everyone’s benefit.
Ethiopia and Egypt have no reason to be at odds over this or any issue, given their millennia-long trade relationships, shared religious heritage, and roles in ending colonialism. It is also why Egypt has rejected talk of a military solution. It has committed to negotiations, engaging with the United Nations, African Union, and others, and yes, even trusting Ethiopia.
But, with the lives and livelihoods of millions of Egyptians and Sudanese at stake, we need a lot more verification, and a little less trust.
Amgad Naguib is Founder of Agora Communications (anaguib@agoracoms.com) a strategic communications advisory based in Maryland. The views expressed are the author's own.
