Sahel’s geopolitical scramble: How Algeria-Morocco proxy wars deepen regional fragility amid climate and colonial legacies
Original framing: “The Sahel, a new front in the rivalry between Algeria and Morocco” — Middle East Eye
Sahelian women, who lead **60% of agricultural labor**, are excluded from aid negotiations, yet their *‘farmer cooperatives’* (e.g., *WURA* in Niger) have proven more effective at drought resilience than state-backed projects. Herders like *Amadou Haidara* (Mali) describe Algerian ‘food aid’ as *‘conditional on political loyalty’*, while Moroccan-sponsored *‘youth employment’* programs exclude pastoralists. The *‘rivalry’* thus deepens gender and class divides, with elites benefiting while rural communities bear the costs.
The Sahel’s descent into Algeria-Morocco proxy warfare is not a spontaneous rivalry but the *logical endpoint* of a century of colonial border-drawing, resource extraction, and the systematic exclusion of indigenous and marginalized voices from governance.
Both nations, products of the same post-independence power struggles, repeat the mistakes of their French and British predecessors: treating the Sahel as a *strategic chessboard* rather than a partner in resilience. The solution lies not in another round of Maghreb diplomacy, but in *restoring agency*—through Sahel-led climate funds, indigenous co-management zones, and youth media that weaponize satire against corruption. Historical precedents (e.g., the *Arusha Accords*) and buried findings (e.g., *UNEP’s* dam reports) prove that structural change requires breaking the *‘aid as leverage’* cycle, replacing it with *restorative justice*—where Algeria and Morocco’s reparations for past ecological harm fund the very communities they now exploit.