Latest information from Mozambique indicates that at least 250,000 residents formerly displaced by an insurgency in the northern part of the country have returned home after the return to normalcy in the former restive province of Cabo Delgado. The insurgency, which was launched in 2017 by Ansar al Sunnah wal Jama’a, an Islamist group linked to global terror group ISIS, claimed more than 4,000 lives, displaced hundreds of thousands and paralysed economic activity. ALSO READ: Cabo Delgado: Over 250,000 people return home With the return to normalcy, according to reports, critical infrastructure including roads, ports - both sea and airport - have also since reopened, bringing hope for economic recovery in the region that has been in ruins. ALSO READ: Rwanda, Mozambique security forces conduct Umuganda, treat hundreds of patients in Cabo Delgado While complete securing of the region remains work in progress, Rwandans are being thanked by their counterparts in the southern African country for the role by Rwandan security forces – the Rwanda Defence Force and Rwanda National Police – in helping them to defeat the terrorists. The government of Rwanda in 2021 deployed a contingent of security forces in Cabo Delgado at the request of their Mozambican counterparts to help them in the fight against the terror group that had captured several parts of this province, killing and displacing hundreds of thousands. The Rwandan forces then worked with their Mozambican counterparts and quickly overrun the areas formerly captured by the terrorists and have since been part of the process to restore order in the region. There is a lot to learn from the success of the joint effort by the Rwandan troops and their colleagues in Mozambique from the perspective of restoring order in conflict-hit countries, especially in the face of the dismal performance of UN peacekeeping missions. While no scientific process has been carried out to establish why this Mozambique model has seemingly yielded quick results, when compared to UN missions as we know them, one clear thing is the trust the joint forces seem to enjoy amongst the population. With the national army working hand in hand with their colleagues from Rwanda, they have been able to get buy-in from the population, which then seemed to expedite the efforts to repulse the terrorists from their previous strongholds. It is too early to completely discredit UN peacekeeping missions, but this model could probably be pondered on by the UN Security Council, because one of the main challenges in these traditional missions has been the use of peacekeepers from far-flung countries, and many of them, which has made buy-in from population a difficult task. A classic example is MONUSCO, billed the world’s most expensive peacekeeping mission, which is set to exit DR Congo at the end of this year, leaving behind a trail of failures accumulated during their over two decades of deployment. ALSO READ: In Cabo Delgado, Rwandan medics are overwhelmed but not intimidated Peacekeepers from MONUSCO come from dozens of countries, majority of them not even in Africa, which makes communication even within the force itself problematic. Mozambique is therefore worth looking at because in most cases troop contributing countries to UN peacekeeping missions mean well, but end up disappointed like all us when the mission fails to yield the intended result.
