Central African Republic: changing deck chairs on the Titanic?

Will a new government combined with a bigger peacekeeping effort put the CAR on the path to national stability?

Date: 2014-09-22

Time: 14:00 to 16:00

Venue: Conference room , ISS Pretoria , Block C, Brooklyn Court , 361 Veale Street , Google map

RSVP: Elizabeth Matsaung
Email: [email protected]
Phone: +27 12 346 9500

Assembly line peacekeeping. That’s been the international community’s formula for fixing the Central African Republic (CAR).

Earlier this month the African Union (AU) called the African-led International Support Mission to the Central African Republic (MISCA) a success. Nine months after MISCA took over from the Multinational Force of Central Africa (FOMAC) – a regional peacekeeping force – the green berets of the AU were turned in for the new blue ones of the UN Multidimensional Integrated Stabilisation Mission in the CAR (MINUSCA) last week.

The colour of the berets of peacekeepers in the CAR has changed regularly over the past two decades. All of these missions, from the regionally-led Inter-African Mission to Monitor the Implementation of the Bangui Agreements (MISAB) in the 1990s, followed by the UN’s Mission in the Central African Republic (MINURCA) at the end of that decade and on to MINUSCA today have one thing in common – operating in a country that has none of the trappings of a sovereign state.

A peace deal struck in Libreville last year said elections must be held in 2015. Will a new government combined with a bigger and more expensive peacekeeping effort put the CAR on the path to national stability?

Veteran CAR watcher David Smith dissects recent history and looks at what the near future holds for what many refer to as a phantom state.

Chair: Paul-Simon Handy, regional expert on the United Nations panel of experts on the Central African Republic

Speaker: David Smith, ISS consultant