Civil Society in Early Warning - The Experience of
WANEP’s National Early Warning System (NEWS)
Presented by
Chukwuemeka B. Eze: Program Director, WANEP
At the ECOWAS Consultative Meeting on Establishment of National
Early Warning Mechanism in the ECOWAS Member States
21 – 25 Oct. 2013
Abidjan, Cote d’Ivoire
Presentation Outline
• Background
•Why CSOs in Early Warning
•Why NEWS
•Objectives of NEWS
•Scope of NEWS
•Structure of NEWS
•Benefits of NEWS
•Sustainability of NEWS
•Challenges of NEWSP
•What is CS and Why CSs in Early Warning
•Conclusion
Background
The
West Africa Network for Peacebuilding Early Warning and Early
Response Program, WARN, focuses on enhancing human security in
West Africa by detecting and preventing conflicts that could turn violent;
prevent or mitigate on-going conflicts from further escalation; working with
countries in post conflict stages to ensure that “never again” should there
be relapse to violence.
The institutionalization of early warning (particularly community-based early
warning) as an integral part of peacebuilding has yielded tremendous
dividends and constituted the basis for the WANEP-ECOWAS partnership
for conflict prevention that has existed since 2002.
Background
 The establishment of a National Early Warning System (NEWS) across all WANEP
networks in West Africa has been long in the pipeline of WANEP to strengthen
the Warning and Response Network (WARN) programme since the
commencement of the programme in 2000 as part of its conflict prevention and
peacebuilding regime.
 In West Africa, the presence and penetrative powers of the State are limited and
hardly reach remote communities that are at risk of both man-made and natural
catastrophes including violent conflict.
 In light of the state of affairs in West Africa, WANEP regards the establishment of
a robust early warning system not as a project with a short to medium life-span
but as an institution to be professionalised and sustained with the aim of
contributing towards the enhancement of human security and socio-economic
development; hence the need for the NEWS.
Why CSO involvement in Early Warning?
WANEP believes that the best and most sustainable peacebuilding approach is
that which is locally generated and externally supported
•The objective of a people-centred EWS is to empower individuals and
communities threatened by violent conflicts to act in sufficient time and in an
appropriate manner to reduce the possibility of personal injury, loss of life and
damage to property and the environment. A complete and effective EWS
comprises
of
four
inter-related
elements,
spanning
knowledge
of
violence/hazards and vulnerabilities through to preparedness and capacity to
respond.
•
Best practices for an early warning system requires strong inter-linkages and
effective communication channels between all of the elements.
Why CSO involvement in Early Warning?
 Knowledge of Existing Risk: Risks arise from the combination of
hazards and vulnerabilities at a particular location. Assessments of risk
require systematic collection and analysis of data and should consider the
dynamic nature of hazards and vulnerabilities that arise from processes
such as youth bulge, population growth, availability of arms, urbanization,
rural land-use change, environmental degradation etc. CSO usually follow
up on this and have better insights on them
 Monitoring Service: Continuous monitoring of conflict trends and
precursors is essential to generate accurate warnings in a timely fashion.
Warning services for different conflicts should be coordinated where
possible to gain the benefit of shared institutional, procedural and
communication networks. This gives the impetus for the training of a pool
of CSOs community monitors to perform this function on the basis of their
knowledge of local contexts.
Why CSO involvement in Early Warning?
Reporting and Communication:
Warnings must reach those at risk and
those with capacity to avert and or cushion the effect of such situations.
Clear messages containing simple, useful information are critical to enable
proper responses that will help safeguard lives and livelihoods.
This includes using early warning data to develop policy briefs,
communicating incidents and situations on a regular basis. CSOs are well
positioned to perform this function based on its proximity to communities
The use of multiple communication channels is necessary to ensure as
many people as possible are warned, to avoid failure of any one channel,
and to reinforce the warning message.
Why CSO involvement in Early Warning?
Response Capacity and Capability: Early Warning without Early
Response could be counterproductive. It is therefore essential that
communities understand their risks; respect the warning and know how to
react when such issues leading to violence erupt. Education and
preparedness programmes play a key role. It is also essential that conflict
management plans like community mediation, negotiation and other dispute
resolution mechanisms are in place and rooted in the community institutions.
The community should be well informed on options for and how best to avoid
damage and loss to property. This is the basis of WANEP and CSOs
peacebuilding initiatives across the region.
In summary, CSO involvement in Early
Warning is Essential....
•Because CSOs are aware of events as they unfold, they can make
important contributions to early warning
•They can act swiftly and flexibly to respond to conditions as needed,
often using innovative and non-coercive strategies and quality processes
to address problems
•CSOs can act when-for various reasons-official actors are immobilised
(often related to mandates, lack of political will or the implications
conveyed by their official status)
Why NEWS?
 The fragility of peace and stability in the West African region demands vigilance
and close monitoring of the state of security.
 Besides, current conflicts centres around the communities in form of intra states
rather than interstate conflicts while future conflict will be around the
environment and scare resources owing to global climate change and
governance. The conditions in rural communities will be more exacerbating due
to lack of information.
 NEWS is created to complement and reinforce the ECOWAS Warning and
Response Network (ECOWARN). NEWS strives to respond to critical demands
for pertinent information relating to human security and violent conflict
especially at local community level. Vital information at community level that
goes uncollected and unreported is needed for the purposes of conflict
prevention.
Why NEWS…?
According to the ECOWAS Conflict Prevention Framework (ECPF),
conflict prevention is defined as:
Activities designed to reduce tensions and prevent the outbreak,
escalation, spread or recurrence of violence. Conflict prevention
strategies may distinguish between operational prevention (measures
applicable in the face of imminent crisis) and structural prevention
(measures to ensure that crises do not arise in the first place or, if they
do, that they do not re-occur).
The emphasis is not on preventing conflict per se (conflict being a
natural consequence of change) but in halting its descent into
violence.
Why NEWS…?
In other words, the goal of ECPF, to which WANEP subscribes, is not to prevent “peaceful”
conflict but rather “violent”, “armed” and “destructive” conflict that takes away innocent
lives, threatens to tear apart communities, retards socio-economic development, destroys
centuries-old traditional and cultural values, and perpetuates the culture of violence for
generations to come.
To undertake both operational and structural prevention, the need for vital early warning
information cannot be emphasised enough.
Nonetheless, the current ECOWARN structure by itself cannot meet this challenge in terms
of its scope and magnitude. ECOWARN is more regional in character; as a result, it does not
cater for the specificities and idiosyncrasies of individual country, which NEWS strives to
capture. Moreover, there are only 15 civil society’s focal points (one monitor per ECOWAS
Member State) in addition to WANEP’s four Zonal Coordinators and the staff at the WANEP
Peace Monitoring Centre. In terms of personnel to carry out the information gathering and
reporting, the current number is inadequate. With the advent of NEWS, the number of
monitors will increase significantly as well as the volume of information gathered and
reported per country.
Objectives of NEWS
 Develop of a pool of Conflict Monitors and Analysts across West Africa and link
them to the ECOWAS Early Warning Mechanism at the various member states
as well as the WANEP Peace Monitoring Centre in order to support the ECOWAS
Commission’s Situation Room at EWD;
 Build the capacity of civil society organizations to alert, mitigate, prevent and/or
resolve violent conflicts at local levels and provided the state with the necessary
support to do same;
 Consolidate the institutional capacity of WANEP in conflict prevention and
collaborate with other inter-governmental bodies such as , AU, UN (OCHA), and
other relevant partners to coordinate early warning and response efforts
Objectives of NEWS
 Foster collaborative relationships with/between civil society, think
tanks, existing national, sub-regional/regional and international early
warning, conflict prevention, and peacebuilding organizations.
 Share early warning reports, policy briefs, preventive instruments,
mechanisms, tools, and strategies with partners, stakeholders, policy
makers/actors potential interveners.
 Promote pro-active/preemptive and integrated approaches to conflict
prevention and peacebuilding.
Geographical Scope
West Africa
Ma li
Nige r
Sen egal
Th e Ga mbi a
Guine a B issa u
Chad
Guine a
Sierra
Le one
Libe ria
Burk ina
Fa s o
Be nin
Nige ria
Côte
d’Iv oire Gha na
Togo
Ca meroon
NEWS Framework
• Information Gathering Component
– Development of Indicators
– Data Collection
• Information Reporting Component
– Incident Report
– Situation Report
– Analytic Report (Narrative, Graphs, Figures)
NEWS Structure
PMC WANEP
Regional Office
Accra
WANEP/EWD
Liaison Office
ECOWAS Comm Abuja
ZC 1
Banjul
NEWS
Managers
The Gambia, Senegal, Guinea
Bissau, Cape Verde
National
Analysts
.
Community
Monitors
.
ZC 2
Ouagadougou
NEWS
Managers
Burkina Faso, Côted'Ivoire, Mali, Niger
National
Analysts
.
Community
Monitors
.
ZC 3
ZC 4
Monrovia
Cotonou
NEWS
Managers
Liberia, Ghana, Guinea,
Sierra Leone
National
Analysts
.
Community
Monitors
.
NEWS
Managers
Benin , Togo , Nigeria
National
Analysts
.
Community
Monitors
.
Benefits of NEWS
 NEWS is the first civil society-led system across West Africa to
provide information with the view of enhancing human security. Its
products are disseminated as widely as possible.
 NEWS creates the platform for “crowd-sourcing” providing real
time incident reports in time of humanitarian disaster at national
level.
 NEWS provides ECOWARN with greater access to community-level
information on security, which in turn (we hope) would feed into
the Continental Early Warning system of the African Union.
Benefits of NEWS
 NEWS informs interventions and programme designs of WANEP
national networks and other interested civil society organisations
to promote conflict resolution and peacebuilding in West Africa
 Under NEWS, WANEP has started conducting conflict census at
predetermined intervals to measure the number of active and
dormant conflicts in West Africa.
 The periodic conflict census tracks and provide figures as to
whether West Africa is becoming more peaceful or violent with the
number of conflict resolved or outbreak of violence reported
respectively.
Sustainability of NEWS
 The sustainability of NEWS rests squarely on its viability, credibility
and results. For its viability, the system is cost-effective and userfriendly, and personnel are drawn from network members
comprising of Community-based organisation (CBOs).
 For its credibility, the information provided will be of use and
importance to governments, development, humanitarian and
peacebuilding
organisations,
regional
and
international
organisations and research institutions. The result of NEWS is to
make tangible impacts in the enhancement of human security and
peaceful communities at national and regional level.
 In short, the success and results of NEWS will ensure its
sustainability.
Challenges
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
Personnel
Finance
Timeliness
Regularity of data collection and reporting
Documentation of responses
Follow-up
Dissemination of products
Results and Impacts
Concluding…….
 The primary role of outsiders is to create spaces and support
inclusive processes that enable those directly involved to make
decisions about the specific arrangements for addressing the
causes of conflict.
 Outsiders must avoid actions that displace and undermine homegrown initiatives or that promote short-term objectives at the
expense of long-term prevention.
 Peacebuilding and security can only be sustained if anchored on
the people
Conclusion
• NEWS is not just the provision of NEWS which journalists are
better trained to do, it is not just about prophesy which Prophets
are better placed to do, it is not just about alarm and indictment of
the state which the Human rights communities are doing very well,
• Its is about early detection of risks, its analysis and communication
in the form that will enable policy makers take timely and
appropriate actions and also put responsibilities on CSOs as
partners in progress
• While the Primary responsibility for conflict prevention rests with
national governments and other local actors. Greater ownership is
likely to result in a more legitimate process & sustainable
outcomes.