Nile water agreement a ‘threat’ to Egypt

Five African nations have forged a new agreement on sharing water from the Nile, much to the consternation of Egypt, which has long seen the river as its own

Treaties signed in 1929 and 1959 have guaranteed that Egypt receives most of the water that flows down the Nile, but the new agreement signed by Ethiopia, Kenya, Rwanda, Tanzania and Uganda  is intended to reconsider the treaties’ contents.  The treaties grant Egypt rights to 55.5 billion cubic metres of Nile water, while Sudan is guaranteed a further 18.5 billion cubic metres – which together accounts for 87 per cent of the river’s flow. The 1929 treaty also grants Egypt veto power on upstream projects such as dams and large irrigation schemes that could reduce river flow.

Egypt considers the new agreement a ‘death sentence’, and is now attempting to open discussions with the other parties, as well as cementing its alliance with Sudan. The country’s  80 million people draw around 90 per cent of their water from the Nile, and the Egyptian government claims that even under the current regime, demand will outstrip supply by 2017.

‘Some people in Egypt have old-fashioned  ideas based on the assumption that the Nile water belongs to Egypt,’ Ethiopian prime minister Meles Zenawi recently told Al-Jazeera. ‘The circumstances have changed and changed forever.’

July 2010