Chapter 5: Climate change, human security and the humanitarian crisis in the Lake Chad Basin region: selected legal and developmental aspects with a special focus on water governance

Abstract

Since independence from either the French or the English in the early 1960s, the countries of the Lake Chad Basin (LCB) region, with a longstanding history of violent conflict, have been plagued by serious humanitarian crises. This is inter alia due to complex political instability, weak economic and social policies, which have prolonged the national and international conflicts. Low levels of economic development vary between riparian nation states, poor education systems, widespread illiteracy, sharp gender disparities, high health risks, water and food insecurity are marks of the crisisstricken region. The LCB area represents the poorest, most marginalised and neglected part of each respective country, with poor provision of basic infrastructure and social services; a situation that disfavours various aspects of human security. Nigeria has been hit by successive incidents of unrest, including coup d’états, civil wars and the recent rise of the Islamist extremist group Boko Haram, founded in 2002, that has terrorised the entire region. Chad has for a long time experienced a seemingly endless crisis of civil war since 1963. As an enclave country, it has often been exposed to threats of attacks, human trafficking and armed conflict from Libya, Darfur (South Sudan) and the Central African Republic. Being part of the route that migrants take to reach Europe, the Chadian desert supports the migrations of young people fleeing the unbearable situations of their origins. Niger, ranking second lowest in the world on the Human Development Index1, suffers from continual structural calamities, weak sectoral policies and low levels of investment and development aid, as well as an influx of refugees from Mali and Nigeria. Meanwhile, Cameroon – despite its development deficits – has since 1967 borne the burden of huge refugee inflows from many neighbouring states. Following huge crop damage by locust swarms; the stagnation or decline of crop production, fishing and animal husbandry activities; the constant mobility of people; a sustained crime wave; and health, food and price insecurity despite