Despair Reigns In The Western Sahara

By James Badcock
This commentary was published in the Daily Star on 30/11/2010 

According to the United Nations, Spain still has the status of administering power over Western Sahara. A sense of responsibility, even guilt, over the disputed status of the colonial possession, which was signed away when General Francisco Franco was on his deathbed in 1975, has been plain to see over recent days. This attitude follows the violent break-up by the Moroccan security forces of a protest camp outside the Western Saharan capital of Laayoune.

Yet Spanish Prime Minister Jose Luis Rodriguez Zapatero was forced to interrupt the national angst with a blunt admission that good ties with Morocco were a “priority” and a “state affair.” The truth is that voices in Madrid have very little say on the outcome of the impasse in Western Sahara, and not just because of the interests involved in preferring Morocco’s cooperation on terrorism, immigration and organized crime to the alternative of daily headaches from Spain’s southern flank. It has been amply demonstrated that few states will oblige Rabat to comply with UN procedure regarding what it considers its southern provinces. The Laayoune riots ought to make clear to Morocco and the Polisario independence movement that a workable compromise is a matter of urgency. 

Spain did not even dare doubt the Moroccan version of events in Laayoune: Rabat claimed that the 20,000-strong protest camp had become a stronghold of militarized forces, despite the absence of pro-independence flags and the strictly socio-economic list of aims to which those demonstrating aspired, In doing so, Madrid effectively confirmed that it does not hold the whip hand in the Sahrawi affair – even if it would like to. Yes, Spanish companies have poured increasing amounts of investment into Morocco, but in terms of political capital the Madrid-Rabat relationship depends even more greatly on the Moroccan capacity to establish border traps around the Spanish enclaves of Ceuta and Melilla, aside from a host of security concerns centering on the Straits of Gibraltar.

So who could give either Morocco or the Polisario a push toward treating the sporadic United Nations-hosted talks between the two sides with something approaching urgency?

France continues to trade hegemony for its companies in the Moroccan domestic market for guaranteed support of Morocco in the Security Council. Paris can use its veto if need be to avoid pressure on Rabat to comply with preparations for a referendum in the region.

As for the US, ever since Secretary of State Henry Kissinger informed Spain back in the 1970s that Morocco had been chosen as heir to the desert region, Rabat has been a reliably moderate voice in the Arab world – happier to host a cultural event acknowledging the influence of its once-large Jewish community than churn out vitriol against Israel. With the significant steps toward democracy undertaken soon after Mohammad VI came to power in 1999, and the rise of the jihadist terrorism threat, Washington is bound to view any solution other than one negotiated to Morocco’s satisfaction as suspect. It disturbs the Americans, as well as other governments, that a vast, sparsely populated state on the fringes of southern Europe be without a major military force in charge of security at a time when Al-Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb (AQIM) lurks in the Sahel.

The Polisario only has one backer of any import, and that is Algeria. Algeria hosts the movement and can draw out the process for as long as it wishes. At least it can do this while the Polisario is able to keep tens of thousands of Sahrawis as prisoners of fortune in its desert camps at Tindouf. As long as Morocco is wasting 7 percent of its GDP on pacifying the territory, and is unable to properly tap the resources of Western Sahara (phosphates may be in decline but there is an unknown amount of offshore oil to be discovered besides other potential mineral boons), Algiers seems satisfied that it is getting one over on its regional rival. It is in no mood to give up on its dream of encircling Morocco by establishing a vassal state in Western Sahara.

Rabat has sought to improve relations with Algiers in recent years, making a unilateral effort to open the border between the two countries; but to no avail. Algeria finds itself very much on the supply side in strategic relations, thanks mainly to its vast gas reserves on which Spain and other European markets rely. Its success in bringing its own Islamist insurgency under control and its jealous claim of the lead role in fighting AQIM (from which it has excluded Morocco) make it a sought-after ally, but a hard one to push diplomatically.

The EU’s Neighborhood Policy includes Algeria on its list of nations with which increased trade and political cooperation is envisaged. But contrary to what is happening with Tunisia and Morocco, there are no significant agreements to show for it. The only way forward would be to give freer rein to Paris’ and Madrid’s enthusiasm for Morocco’s preferred-neighbor status, with the conditionality of course being further steps toward true democracy. Rabat’s vague autonomy plan for Western Sahara should be seized upon as the only workable solution, and Morocco should be enticed toward a generous settlement along these lines. In turn, Algeria must be made to feel envious of Morocco as the euro-aid splashes in and fails to cross the absurdly closed border between the two countries.

Diplomatically speaking the impasse is total. However, the recent unrest in Western Sahara was sparked by dissatisfaction with the sterile living conditions in which Sahrawis find themselves trapped. Morocco and the aging Polisario leadership could be wasting valuable time as violence and despair take a stronger grip on the desert region.