Setting the scene for transboundary water politics

In April 2011, Ethiopia, a country that supplies 86% of the Nile’s water, laid plans to construct the largest hydropower project: the Grand Ethiopian Renaissance Dam, at the Ethiopian-Sudanese border on the Blue Nile. In 2022, I begin writing this blog following news that this past August Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed of Ethiopia announced the completion of the filling of the third reservoir of the Grand Ethiopian Renaissance Dam (GERD). I have chosen water and politics as the focus of my blog to delve deeper into my particular interest in the contemporary relations between the Nile's riparian countries and transboundary water management.

 

Figure one: Ethiopian Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed announcing the filling of the GERD reservoir.

In the lead-up to writing this blog, I came across a podcast. The host outlined how water does not care or conform to the national territories. There being 11 countries that share the resource of the Nile it seems complex, transboundary solutions are necessary for the effective use and restrictions of this shared resource. There are, however, biases in examining water politics in the African frame, and in a literary commentary on the West's perception of Africa, Binyavanga Wainaina outlines these issues to ensure the vastness of the African continent is not reduced to be seen as a singular entity.

Figure two: Geopolitics and power podcast.

Therefore, in this series of blog, I want to begin by examining the unequal power relations that were fostered by British colonial history to situate the relations between the Eastern Nile countries. Moreover,  I will explore why Ethiopia's GERD is perceived as a threat to Sudan and Egypt. When considering Egypt's population growth concerns increasing demand for water; Sudan's unrestricted use of the Nile for its crucial agricultural economy and global warming exacerbating water security it becomes patently more clear the complexity of managing the Nile's transboundary water resource.