Tomorrow (07 May), the African Union (AU) Peace and Security Council (PSC) will convene its 1278th session to receive a briefing on the theme ‘AU Support to Member States (The Gambia, Lesotho, Madagascar, Mali, and South Sudan) on Security Sector Reform (SSR): Lessons Learned and Perspectives on the Way Forward’.

The session will commence with opening statements by Harold Bundu Saffa, Permanent Representative of Sierra Leone to the AU and PSC Chairperson for May, followed by introductory remarks from Bankole Adeoye, Commissioner for Political Affairs, Peace and Security (PAPS). Statements are expected from the representatives of The Gambia, Lesotho, Madagascar, and South Sudan. Mali, currently suspended from AU activities, will not participate in the session. In addition, statements may be delivered by the Regional Economic Communities/Regional Mechanisms (RECs/RMs). Parfait Onanga-Anyanga, Special Representative of the Secretary-General to the AU and Head of the United Nations Office to the AU (UNOAU), will also address the session. The Institute for Security Studies (ISS) may brief the PSC on the study reviewing the SSR processes in the five countries, conducted in partnership with the AU Commission.

This is not the first time the PSC is addressing the issue of Security Sector Reform. The last dedicated discussion on the theme took place at the 874th session in September 2019, held in the context of the commemoration of Africa Amnesty Month. In that session, the PSC underscored that good governance of the security sector is a sine qua non for sustainable economic and political development and recognised SSR as a ‘delicate, sensitive, and politically complex process’ requiring careful handling. SSR is also featured regularly in PSC discussions on country-specific situations. For instance, at its 844th session in April 2019, the PSC considered a progress report on SSR in The Gambia. During its 1219th session in June 2024, while reviewing the report of its field mission to South Sudan, the PSC called on the Chairperson of the Commission to provide technical support to South Sudan on SSR, Disarmament, Demobilisation and Reintegration (DDR), and the collection of weapons currently in illegal possession.

Beyond the PSC, the AU Commission undertook several activities in 2023 to mark the 10th anniversary of the AU SSR Policy Framework, adopted by the AU Assembly at its 20th Ordinary Session. In November 2023, it convened a major conference under the theme ‘The African Union Security Sector Reform Policy Framework: A Decade of Implementation’. This served as a platform for reflecting on achievements, challenges, and lessons from a decade of AU support to Member States, while setting a course for the next phase. Also in November, the AU Commission convened the 5th meeting of the AU/Regional Economic Communities (RECs) SSR Steering Committee—established in 2019—which reviewed the implementation of the AU SSR Policy Framework and discussed follow-up on the Addis Ababa conference, agreeing to submit recommendations to the PSC for strategic guidance.

The AU Commission, in partnership with the ISS, has also conducted a study documenting lessons from AU engagement on SSR in The Gambia, Lesotho, Madagascar, Mali, and South Sudan. Tomorrow’s session is expected to build on this study, offering a reflection on AU’s engagement over the past decade, identifying gaps, and informing recalibrated approaches to better support Member States.

Over the years, the engagement of the AU in SSR is anchored on various normative and institutional frameworks elaborated as part of its peace and security mandate. The 2013 AU SSR Policy Framework remains central, offering guidance to the AU, RECs, Member States, and partners on implementing SSR programmes. SSR is also a pillar of the AU’s Post-Conflict Reconstruction and Development Policy—revised in 2024—which outlines key objectives for conflict-affected states. Complementing this framework, the AU Commission has developed several Operational Guidance Notes (OGNs) on aspects of SSR including training, needs assessments, legislative harmonisation, codes of conduct, good practices, monitoring and evaluation, and gender integration. In October 2024, the Commission also finalised draft OGNs on ‘Oversight and Accountability in SSR’ and ‘SSR and Mediation’, which were validated through a workshop.

At the institutional level, the AU’s DDR/SSR Division, under the Governance and Conflict Prevention Directorate, oversees SSR-related activities. The Commission also established mechanisms for regular dialogue and coordination, including the triannual SSR Africa Forum and the annual SSR Steering Committee, which bring together the AU, RECs, the UN, and other partners to coordinate support and share best practices.

The AU’s SSR work is integral to its broader peace and security agenda, including Aspiration 4 of Agenda 2063 and the ‘Silencing the Guns’ flagship initiative, which should be applied not only in post-conflict settings but also as a conflict prevention strategy. Its efforts focus on three core areas: providing direct technical support to Member States, generating knowledge tools and building capacity, and promoting coordination among actors. Support to Member States is provided upon request and typically covers design, implementation, and coordination of nationally led SSR processes.

Tomorrow’s briefing is expected to highlight country-specific engagements by the AU Commission in the five focus countries.

In The Gambia, AU support has demonstrated how modest interventions can yield significant results. Between 2018 and 2020, the AU Technical Support Team to The Gambia (AUTSTG)—a small group of SSR and rule of law experts—was embedded in national institutions. The team assisted in developing the National Security Policy, structuring the Office of the National Security Adviser, reorganising the Ministry of Defence and the Gambia Armed Forces, and enhancing civil-military cooperation. Though the AUTSTG’s mandate ended in 2020, AU support has continued. In November 2024, the Commission supported the review of the national SSR strategy and helped develop an M&E framework in line with the AU Operational Guidance Note.

In Mali, the AU provided support through its Mission for Mali and the Sahel (MISAHEL), deploying a DDR/SSR expert in 2018 to assist in implementing accelerated DDR and restructuring defence and security forces. In 2024, the AU supported efforts to enhance national capacity for SSR M&E, aligned with Mali’s National SSR Strategy (2020–2024).

AU support to Madagascar began in 2014 after a constitutional crisis. The AU led a joint SSR assessment with partners, identifying key priorities. Subsequently, the Commission deployed SSR experts to the AU Liaison Office in Madagascar to advise on the formulation, design and implementation of a nationally led SSR initiative. This engagement contributed to the adoption of a national SSR Policy in 2016. The Commission also supported the country’s SSR revitalisation processes in the re-establishment of a national SSR coordination mechanism.

In Lesotho, the AU worked in close collaboration with the Southern African Development Community (SADC). In 2016, the AU and SADC supported a national technical workshop on SSR that helped forge consensus on the importance of implementing SSR and establishing the necessary legal, institutional, and financial frameworks. The AU further deployed a consultant to support the reform process.

In South Sudan, following a request from the government and a PSC decision, the AU deployed a DDR/SSR consultant between November 2023 and February 2024 to support the Strategic Defence and Security Review Board (SDSRB) in developing SSR guidelines, which were validated in July 2024. Ongoing technical needs, the Commission also deployed a senior DDR/SSR consultant with arms management expertise in November 2024.

In addition to highlighting technical support, tomorrow’s briefing is expected to reflect on key challenges and lessons. One of the major challenges in this regard is securing political will. SSR is not merely a technical exercise but is fundamentally political as it involves control over the state’s coercive instruments. As such, governments may be reluctant to embrace SSR, particularly when it challenges entrenched power structures. Even when SSR is launched—sometimes to meet donor expectations—it often lacks genuine political backing or adequate resources. South Sudan provides a case in point: despite AU support, the SSR process has stalled amid delays in force unification and deployment. Tensions between President Salva Kiir and First Vice President Riek Machar, exacerbated by the 4 March 2025 incident, underline the risks of half-hearted commitment.

These experiences demonstrate the importance of advocacy and awareness-raising to encourage Member States to view SSR as essential to peace and democratisation. Trust is also vital. Without confidence in the support provided—both in terms of the AU’s impartiality and the expertise of its consultants—Member States may resist or delay cooperation. Ensuring national ownership and deploying highly qualified technical experts are critical for success.

Moreover, while SSR is a necessary condition for sustainable peace, it is not sufficient on its own. To achieve lasting outcomes, it must be embedded within broader processes of political reform and democratisation. In this context, it is particularly important to integrate and ensure the coordinated implementation of interrelated programmes such as DDR and transitional justice as part of a comprehensive political settlement.

The complex socio-political and security dynamics in political transitions and stabilisation processes present another challenge, often slowing SSR implementation. The lack of inclusive processes and the failure to design gender-sensitive SSR programmes are also critical gaps that need to be addressed

Another challenge is funding. AU support to the five countries has often involved short-term consultancy deployments due to budget constraints, even though long-term engagement is necessary. Increasing the allocation of resources from the AU Peace Fund could help address this gap. The recent operationalisation of the Peace Fund and its Crisis Reserve Facility (CRF), in line with the Assembly’s February 2023 decision [Assembly/AU/Dec.2(XXXVI)], is a promising development. It is to be recalled that the AU disbursed USD 1 million in late 2023 to support DDR efforts in Ethiopia. Given the involvement of multiple stakeholders in SSR, enhanced coordination also remains imperative to prevent duplication and ensure efficient use of limited resources.

The expected outcome of the session is a communiqué. The PSC is expected to commend the decades of support provided by the AU Commission to Member States in implementing SSR programmes. It may encourage Member States to fully utilise the technical support offered by the Commission, including the AU SSR Policy Framework and Operational Guidance Notes. At the same time, the communiqué may underscore the need to address key challenges impeding effective SSR implementation, particularly the lack of political commitment and funding gaps. In this context, the PSC may highlight the importance of sustained advocacy and awareness-raising to promote SSR as a cornerstone of lasting peace. The PSC may call for embedding SSR in robust security sector governance reform and political settlement. It may also emphasise the need for adequate and predictable funding to strengthen the Commission’s support. To this end, and alongside efforts to mobilise resources and coordinate with international partners, the PSC may explore the possibility of leveraging the AU Peace Fund to finance SSR support to Member States. It may further encourage Member States to integrate SSR-related expenditures into their national budgets. Finally, the PSC may stress the imperative of designing and implementing inclusive and gender-responsive SSR programmes in Member States.

Tomorrow (18 December), the AU Peace and Security Council (PSC) is expected to convene its 1252nd session at the ambassadorial level to receive an update on the progress made towards Silencing the Guns in Africa and consider and adopt its provisional program of work for January 2025.

The session commences with the opening remarks of Abdi Mahamoud Eybe, the Permanent Representative of the Republic of Djibouti to the AU and the Chairperson of the PSC for the month of December. Bankole Adeoye, the Commissioner for Political Affairs, Peace and Security (PAPS), is expected to deliver a statement. Mohamed Ibn Chambas, the AU High Representative for Silencing the Guns, is expected to deliver a briefing on the agenda item. This is expected to share the review of the implementation of the Master Roadmap and the progress made, if any, and the challenges facing the flagship project. Amani Africa has also been invited to make a presentation on the subject, drawing on its recent research report.

Silencing the Guns (STG) is AU’s flagship initiative, which was born out of the recognition, stated in the AU Constitutive Act, that sustainable development and economic prosperity are impossible to achieve in Africa without lasting peace. It was conceived during the 50^th Anniversary of the Organization of African Unity/ African Union (OAU/AU) in 2013 as part of the Solemn Declaration, where member states pledged to ‘rid the continent of wars, civil conflicts, human rights violations, and violent conflicts’. Subsequently, the STG thus constitute one of the flagship projects of the AU’s Agenda 2063, which is anchored on the Agenda’s aspiration for a peaceful and secure Africa. Building on the undertaking of AU Member States under the 50^th OAU/AU anniversary Solemn Declaration ‘to end all wars by 2020’, the AU envisioned achieving the objective of STG by 2020.

In order to translate the vision into practical steps, the Peace and Security Council developed the AU Master Roadmap of Practical Steps to Silence the Guns, which was adopted by the 29^th Ordinary Session of the AU Assembly in January 2017. The Lusaka Master Roadmap (2016) provided a framework for addressing the root causes of conflict, focusing on five interlinked areas: political governance, economic development, societal cohesion, environmental sustainability and peace and security. The roadmap emphasises strengthening conflict prevention and resolution mechanisms, advancing post-conflict reconstruction, addressing governance and economic drivers of conflict, fostering democracy and the rule of law and curbing the proliferation of illicit arms.

Despite progress made towards resolving some conflicts, as illustrated by the signing of a revitalised peace agreement in South Sudan in 2018, the ambition of silencing the guns by 2020 unsurprisingly failed to materialise. As a result, the 14^th Extra-Ordinary Session of the AU Assembly, held on December 6, 2020, in Johannesburg, South Africa, decided to extend the timeline by ten years to 2030. As part of enhancing implementation and in a bid to achieve the STGs initiative, the ‘Monitoring and Evaluation Mechanism for the AU Master Roadmap of Practical Steps for Silencing the Guns in Africa by 2030’ was adopted in June 2021 in line with the recommendation given during the 28^th Ordinary Session of the AU Assembly of Heads of States.

Tomorrow’s session is being convened within the framework of the decision of the AU Assembly to review the implementation of the flagship project every two years following the extension. Thus, the session offers an opportunity to reflect on the continent’s current security landscape, assess the implementation of the initiative, and identify effective strategies to bridge the gap between the ambition to rid Africa of conflicts and the realities on the ground.

It would be of particular interest for PSC not only to be informed about the setbacks faced towards achieving the STG and the nature and gravity of the setbacks but also the factors that explain the setbacks and the measures that need to be taken to put the STG on a path of progress. Despite the extension of the timeline for STG to 2030, the peace and security situation on the continent did not get any better than it was in 2020. By AU’s own admission, some of the limited progresses achieved are a far cry from the lofty goals and objectives set out in the AU Master Roadmap for silencing the guns in Africa and the scale of peace and security challenges. Parts of the continent remain mired in conflict, and new challenges to peace and security have proliferated.

As extensively analysed in Amani Africa’s Special Research report, the gap between the much-needed flagship agenda of STG and the harsh realities on the ground has widened over the years, highlighting the significant challenges the AU faced in implementing the STG. First, there is an increase in the number of conflicts on the continent. Analysis of the work of the PSC established that the number of conflict situations on the agenda of the PSC increased by nearly threefold in the ten-year period from 2013 to 2023. This indicates both the spread of conflicts/crises and the rise in the number of such conflicts/crises within individual countries. Apart from the increase in the number of conflicts, Africa has also experienced, during the first ten years of the STG, an expansion in the geographic spread of conflicts. Additionally, the humanitarian consequences of the spike in the number and the expansion in the geographic spread of conflicts have also registered an alarming increase. For example, Amani Africa’s report established that the number of internally displaced persons increased by three times between 2013 and 2023.

This exponential increase in the number of crisis/conflict situations on the agenda of the PSC can be attributed to three factors. The first of these is the growth in conflicts involving terrorist groups. Apart from the emergence of Lake Chad Basin as a main threat of conflicts involving terrorism during the first part of the first ten years of the STGs, this increase in the number of conflicts on the agenda of the PSC involving terrorist groups is attributable to the expansion of such conflicts and their subsequent prominence in the Sahel and the eruption of such conflict in Southern Africa in the Cabo Delgado province of Mozambique.

The second factor for the rise in the number of crisis/conflict situations on the agenda of the PSC relates to the resurgence of military coups, particularly since 2020. Since August 2020, there have been nine successful military takeovers. With six countries suspended from the AU, the recent surge in coups has led to a swath of nations under military rule across the Sahel, stretching from the Atlantic coast in Guinea and Gabon through the central Sahel to the Red Sea coast in Sudan.

The third factor has to do with the eruption of new armed conflicts and those other crises involving political instability and incidents of violence that triggered the involvement of the PSC. Apart from the civil war in South Sudan that erupted in December 2013, other newly erupted conflicts involve the civil war in the Tigray region of Ethiopia (Nov 2020 on PSC agenda since October 2021), Eastern DRC (the re-emergence of the M23 rebellion and the ensuing fighting in Eastern DRC in April 2022, on PSC agenda since August 2022) and the recent one involving the Sudan Armed Forces (SAF) and Rapid Support Forces (RSF) in Sudan since April 2023.

Amani Africa’s research report also established the increase in inter-communal conflicts and internationalised intra-state conflicts. The growing interference by foreign powers and other international actors, leading to increased internationalisation of conflicts in Africa, is not only shaping conflict dynamics and political behaviour of conflict parties but also undermining the agency of regional and continental policymakers in addressing conflicts and political crises, further straining continental conflict prevention, management and resolution mechanisms. The PSC has also noted the challenges posed by foreign interference in the internal affairs of member states by undermining the efforts to silence the guns as evidenced in the communiques of its 1182^nd and 1237^th sessions. The proliferation of small arms and light weapons also remains a major obstacle to silencing the guns.

Clearly, Africa is far from the AU’s ambition of silencing the guns. A lot remains to be done, and it has to be done differently. All indications are that the goal of silencing the guns cannot be achieved in a business-as-usual approach to the management of the affairs of the countries of the continent and, indeed, peace and security in Africa. Former AU High Representative for Silencing the Guns in Africa Ramtane Lamamra stressed ‘the need to review and adjust our conflict prevention and resolution tools in order to effectively and efficiently respond to the ever-changing nature of conflict, violence and criminality on the continent’. He also underscored the need to ‘reduce the gap between strategic political and military efforts to prevent and resolve conflicts, on the one hand, and investment in economic and social development, on the other hand’.

As highlighted in the research report referenced above, the emergence of terrorism as the dominant peace and security crisis, with parts of the continent becoming the epicentre of terrorism not only in Africa but also globally, has at least three strategic implications for the AU and its conflict prevention, management and resolution tools. The first is the increasing demand for approaches that involve a mix of stabilisation, peace enforcement and peacebuilding capacities that leverage and are deployed along with livelihood supporting development interventions. The other is the growing need for the protection of civilians and equally growing demand for facilitating the delivery of humanitarian assistance. Third, it necessitates that the AU develops a framework on the use of negotiation, mediation and reconciliation tools for such unconventional conflict situations involving terrorism.

Many of the conflicts now dominating the continent’s security landscape did not emerge suddenly. They are the result of long-simmering tensions stemming from interconnected factors such as governance deficits, political marginalisation, environmental pressures, and socio-economic challenges. Yet, the PSC’s focus has remained predominantly on conflict management, with persistent gaps in early warning and early action hindering its ability to proactively address emerging threats. It is, therefore, necessary that political solutions are foregrounded as the primary means of silencing the guns and thus addressing the governance and institutional fragilities and weaknesses that create the conditions both for the emergence and expansion of the terrorist threat and other violent conflicts on the continent.

Considering the new global geo‐political dynamics, enhancing the role of the AU and regional mechanisms in the promotion and maintenance of peace and security in Africa is not an option. This underscores the need for enhancing strategic coordination and cohesion among member states of the AU and a close working relationship between the AU and the RECs/RMs. The PSC’s inaugural annual joint consultative meeting with the SADC organ on Politics Defence and Security and SADC member states on 30 August 2024 recalled the imperative of accelerating the implementation of STG and encouraged SADC member states to regularly report on the implementation of the AU Master Roadmap to silence the guns.

The expected outcome of tomorrow’s session remains unknown. The PSC may adopt a communiqué. If that happens, it is expected that the PSC will highlight the importance of identifying weakness in the implementation of the APSA and the need for enhancing the capacity of AU’s tools for preventive diplomacy and strengthening the Continental Early Warning System. The PSC may underscore the need for reinvigorating and updating the methods, approaches and means of pursuing silencing the guns. It may also call for a more regular review of the progress and challenges to silencing the guns in Africa. In view of the significant deterioration of the peace and security situation on the continent during the past decade, the PSC may request the AU Commission, in collaboration with RECs/RMs, to submit a report to the AU Assembly outlining a new strategy that will enhance progress for silencing the guns in Africa.