CRITICAL APPRAISAL OF OAU’S DIPLOMATIC INTERVENTIONS IN THE POST COLONIAL CHADIAN CRISIS FROM (1965 TO 1979)

Abstract

The Organization of Africa Unity (OAU), now African Union (AU), is known for its principle of non-interference in the internal affairs of member states, yet it believed that only through peace and security can development be guaranteed in the continent. Emerging civil wars within African states had created several theatres of conflict that put not only the international status of the OAU to test, but also its commitment to peace and security in Africa. One of such conflict was the Chadian Civil War of 1965 to 1979. The war had become intractable as it spilled over to other countries with refugee problems. This ugly development, for the first time, challenged the OAU non-interference principle especially when external bodies like France, Libya, the United State of America and the Soviet Union interfered and escalated the crisis. This paper assessed the OAU’s roles of diplomatic intervention in the crisis. The paper relied on secondary sources to examine the diplomatic interventions that the OAU applied and the extent to which the intervention was successful within the ambit of non-interference principle. The study found that the Chadian civil war was more than internal crisis; and the OAU’s inability to intervene forcefully to end the crisis was due to the self-constraining clause in its charter, even when the involvement of foreign countries created grounds for access to arms for the warring factions, and harvest of death for the ordinary Chadians. Based on these findings, the study recommended the need for AU to strength his collective security protocol, and to have a stand by peace keeping force that can intervene in crises situations in Africa.