Battle for the Nile?

from the Online Etymology Dictionary,
an interesting trivia bit provided by one of the video participants below...

The Nile River is not merely one long river running south to north through the Egyptian Sahara desert.  The Nile in northern Sudan and in Egypt is the result of of various tributaries flowing through 11 African nations.  There are two main tributaries, the longer of which is the White Nile flowing into and out of Lake Victoria in Uganda; and the Blue Nile, which provides the larger source of water, flowing from Lake Tana in Africa.  These two main tributaries meet at Khartoum in Sudan, flowing north together through the rest of Sudan and into Egypt.


Why the geography lesson?

An interesting and potentially volatile story is developing over the Nile River water rights as Ethiopia announces their intention to build a dam upon the Blue Nile.

Ethiopian's population is increasing and their country is developing.  They need more electrical power that the dam could generate, and then the power could help develop their economy as well through increased manufacturing, etc.

Why hasn't the Ethiopian government pursued this option before?  It doesn't sound like this is a new idea, but one that has been prevented by Colonial era treaties (negotiated by and with the best interest of the British Empire in mind); in recent years, there may have been a bit of a fear factor preventing Ethiopian leaders from pursuing this project--fear of provoking former Egyptian leader/strongman Mubarak.  But now, things have definitely changed as Egypt is fractured by political in-fighting and a weakened economy--were the Ethiopians thinking, "this is the best time to act"?

The Egyptian government and the people of Egypt have not taken to this news positively; in fact, there were even early rumors of military action to protect the main source of water for the nation.  As you can see in this Al Jazeera English program, the rhetoric has calmed down with the hope of diplomatic resolution, but the position on the dam sounds largely unchanged.



The Ethiopian Minister of Information in the above program wants to stress that this in no way will affect the water supply to Egypt--once it is completed--but there's no real indication of how long that will take and no estimate of the damage that could be done downstream during that process.  The Egyptian representative in the above program wants to see greater conversation about how such a project could be mutually beneficial--of course, Ethiopia, and most of the Nile basin countries, feel that Egypt has drawn on all the benefits of the Nile for centuries without consideration of the others.

Meanwhile, I've overheard some Egyptian Christians talking recently about Isaiah 19, which is a favorite passage of Scripture for the Christian community in Egyptian because it reveals divine, redemptive hope for Egypt.  But the passage also includes this about the Nile River...

   ⁵ The waters of the river will dry up, 
   and the riverbed will be parched and dry. 
⁶ The canals will stink; 
   the streams of Egypt will dwindle and dry up. 
The reeds and rushes will wither, 
   ⁷ also the plants along the Nile, 
   at the mouth of the river. 
Every sown field along the Nile 
   will become parched, will blow away and be no more. 
⁸ The fishermen will groan and lament, 
   all who cast hooks into the Nile; 
those who throw nets on the water 
   will pine away. 


We will be watching the news on this situation closely.  If there are other interesting developments, which there should be as Ethiopia sounds set on beginning this project, we'll let you know...

Continue to pray for Egypt!

UPDATE:
June 1, 2013 - Ethiopian and Egyptian Prime Ministers agree on three principles - this article also references a forthcoming joint-commission report, but not sure that either government will change their opinion based upon rhetoric even within this article.  Strong opinions building in this article's "Comment" section...