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Due to resource constraints, IRIN is not updating the country profile below.
Updated humanitarian country information can be found instead at the Central African Republic country page on ReliefWeb [http://www.reliefweb.int/rw/dbc.nsf/doc104?OpenForm&rc=1&cc=caf].
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 CENTRAL AFRICAN REPUBLIC
Humanitarian Country Profile |
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Background
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Last update: May 2008 |
With a population of some four million, the landlocked Central African Republic (CAR) is one of the poorest countries in the world, despite significant mineral, agricultural and wildlife resources. Political instability and public insecurity have made socio-economic development patchy.
Civilian rule in the former French colony was established in 1993 under President Ange-Felix Patassé, after three decades of destructive military dictatorships since independence in 1960. However, Patassé's government was plagued by unrest and there was a serious outbreak of violence between October 2002 and March 2003. Widespread discontent led to Patassé's removal in a coup led by Gen Francois Bozizé in March 2003.
Bozizé was declared president following his election victory in 2005, but for the first few years of his administration he was faced with continuing insurgency in northern areas as a result of rebel activity engendered in part by the discontent of mercenaries who helped him into power. By early May 2008, all of the rebel groups had signed ceasefire deals with the government, paving the way for a comprehensive peace accord.
Illegal weapons proliferate across the CAR, the legacy of years of unrest. One of the consequences is that there are an estimated 295,000 internally displaced persons (IDPs), and others have taken refuge across borders - some 14,000 people fled to Chad in early 2008.
Peace and security
Now that all rebel groups are engaged in a national peace process, the biggest threat to security is widespread banditry in the north. The situation is exacerbated by poor communications and the limited resources of the nominally 5,000-strong security forces.
A civil war from 2002-2003, mainly in the northwest and centre of the country, was characterised by widespread human rights abuses.
Soon after the 2005 elections, there were reports of attacks on government forces by unidentified armed groups in the northern town of Paoua in Ouham-Pende Province. This led to the fleeing of thousands of civilians to southern Chad.
CAR’s rebel groups - which, in May 2008, had yet to disarm even if they were all observing a truce - include the northwestern-based l’Armée populaire pour la restauration de la république et la démocratie (APRD) headed by Lt Bedaya N’Djadder, a former gendarme who defected from the government’s service; and the northeastern-based Union des forces démocratiques pour le rassemblement (UFDR). There are numerous other legitimate, semi-legal and illegal groups with guns in CAR.
Preparations are under way for an inclusive political dialogue with all of the country’s political actors.
Adding to insecurity in February and March 2008 have been a series of cross-border incursions into northwestern CAR by the Chadian army - apparently in a bid to support ethnic kin in the area. Over 1,000 were internally displaced or forced to flee across the border into Chad, as a result.
France has military forces in the country, which have helped Bozizé fight rebel groups in the northeast. A recent UNHCR report reckoned the government would not survive without France’s direct military support.
EUFOR, a European Union force which will eventually number 3,700 personnel, has a mandate to operate in Chad and northeastern CAR, and has established a base in the town of Birao. The Central African Economic and Monetary Union (CEMAC) has 380 troops in the capital, Bangui, and a 350-strong UN force (MINURCAT), which works hand-in-hand with EUFOR, also has a presence in Birao. It is mandated to help train police and improve judicial infrastructure.
CAR has been affected by regional instability and internal conflict in neighbouring countries (Cameroon, DRC, Chad and Sudan), which has resulted in movements of refugees, arms, and rebel groups across its porous borders.
International non-governmental organisations have frequently faced security problems, and an MSF aid worker was killed in northwestern CAR in June 2007.
IDPs/Refugees
An estimated 295,000 people have been displaced by fighting and crime in the north of the country, according to the Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (2008).
At least 50,000 people are also seeking refuge in southern Chad in the Amboko, Yaroungou, Gondje and Dosseye sites, while an estimated 20,000 have fled fighting to Cameroon.
In southern Chad, UNHCR has started transferring some of the estimated 14,000 refugees who recently fled CAR away from the border to a temporary transit site 25km further inland. (See the UNHCR 18 March 2008 briefing.
To view UNHCR news on CAR click here.
To view to UNHCR’s January 2008 World Report on CAR (with details of government and rebel abuses in 2007) click here.
For a January 2008 Refugees International report entitled CAR: Key Facts on Displacement in the Northwest, click here .
Democracy and governance
For over three decades following independence in 1960, CAR was ruled by presidents not elected democratically. The first democratic elections were held in 1993 bringing President Ange-Felix Patassé to power.
Patassé ruled for 10 years before being deposed by a rebel movement led by Francois Bozizé, a former chief of the armed forces, on 15 March 2003.
After a bloody rebellion in 2002–2003, democracy and constitutional legitimacy returned to CAR with a new constitution, approved by voters in a referendum on 5 December 2004, paving the way for multiparty presidential and parliamentary elections in 2005.
Bozizé won the May 2005 elections, perceived by international observers as democratic, with over 60 percent of the vote in the second round, defeating former Prime Minister Martin Ziguélé.
Under Bozizé, political conditions have remained calm in the capital Bangui, but there has been violence and insecurity in the north and northeast of the country.
Media
Private newspapers criticise government policies and alleged corruption, but have a limited impact because of their cost and the high level of illiteracy.
In the capital, UN-sponsored Radio Ndeke Luka provides balanced output, and rebroadcasts international news programmes. Other radio and TV stations are run by the state-run Radiodiffusion-Television Centrafricaine and provide little coverage of the political opposition. A media law passed in 2004 abolished prison terms for press offences. BBC World Service and Radio France Internationale are available on FM in Bangui.
Source: http://news.bbc.co.uk/
Economy
Despite being endowed with considerable agriculture, timber, mineral, water and wildlife resources, CAR remains one of the poorest countries in the world. Annual per capita GDP is US$1,224 (UNDP, 2008)
“Economic development has also been hampered by the country's landlocked position, a poor transport system, a largely unskilled workforce, and a legacy of misdirected economic policies. The government has also had poor revenue collection and budget outcomes, and is behind in military and civilian payrolls… In 2006, growth reached 4.1 percent, the highest in a decade,” according to the World Bank.
Gross national income per capita is US$350 (World Bank, 2006).
A sharp increase in investments is needed for reconstruction and improving the social sector infrastructure and services, particularly in areas affected by armed conflict.
The country's main exports are diamonds, timber, coffee, cotton and tobacco.
View the World Bank’s country brief for CAR here.
View the World Bank’s development indicators on CAR here.
Population
CAR has a population estimated at four million, with a growth rate at around 1.4 percent per year. Some 66 percent of the population live on less than one US dollar per day UN Population Fund (UNFPA) website country profile for CAR.
The World Bank (2007) estimates the population at 4.3 million.
The total fertility rate per woman aged 15-49 is 4.92 births, with the maternal mortality rate (MMR) per 100,000 live births at a high of 1,100 due to an increase in levels of poverty and lack of access to basic healthcare.
CAR is comprised of many ethnic groups. The main ones are: Baya 33 percent, Banda 27 percent, Mandjia 13 percent, Sara 10 percent, Mboum 7 percent, M'Baka 4 percent, Yakoma 4 percent.
The main languages are French and Sangho (lingua franca) while the major religions are Christianity, Islam and indigenous beliefs.
Most of the population, 57 percent, live in the rural areas, according to the World Bank Development Indicators.
Development indicators
CAR is ranked 171 out of 177 countries on the UN Development Programme’s 2007-08 Human Development Index.
Life expectancy at birth is at 43.7 years. The adult literacy rate as a percentage of the population aged over 15 years is 48.6 percent.
The combined primary, secondary and tertiary gross enrolment ratio is 29.8 percent, according to the World Bank .
View the World Bank data profile for CAR (based on the April 2007 World Bank Development Indicators database) here .
Education
CAR has “one of the world’s weakest educational systems,” according to the country’s Humanitarian Development Partnership Team (HDPTCAR, which comprises UN agencies and NGOs).
Only 1.45 percent of GDP is spent on education, half the African average.
Insecurity in the north has led the formal education system there to “vanish”, according to the same source. With many thousands of people having fled their villages to live in makeshift, temporary settlements away from main roads, “bush schools” have been set up, with parents providing rudimentary tuition.
Where primary education exists, the pupil to teacher ration is 92:1, according to HDPTCAR.
The adult literacy rate for the population above 15 years is 48.6 percent (UNDP, 2007-08).
Net primary school enrolment for boys is 64 percent, and 45 percent for girls, according to the UN Children's Fund (UNICEF).
View detailed UNICEF education statistics on CAR here.
Children
Armed conflict in CAR has gravely worsened the well-being and livelihood of children and women throughout the country, according to UNICEF. Less than 30 percent of children are immunised against vaccine preventable diseases.
Moreover, 3 percent of children under five suffer from nutritional marasmus, the most frequent form of protein-energy malnutrition, in conditions of severe food shortages.
Nearly a quarter of all children under five are underweight for their age, according to the UNDP’s Human Development Index for 2007-08 (based on 2004 data).
According to the latest data from UNICEF, “One in five children dies before their fifth birthday. One third of the population completely lack access to safe water and sanitation, meaning infectious disease is common, particularly amongst displaced populations. At 6.2 percent, the country has one of the region’s highest HIV/AIDS prevalence rates. The country also has an estimated 240,000 HIV/AIDS orphans… Malnutrition remains a serious problem with 38 percent of the country’s children suffering from Global Chronic Malnutrition and 10 percent suffering from Global Acute Malnutrition. Just 51 percent of children enrol in primary school. In the conflict affected regions, more than 75 percent remain out of school. The use of child soldiers remains prevalent, particularly in the northwest.”
Health
Life expectancy at birth is 43.7 years (UNDP, 2007-08).
There is a shortage of health personnel, with 0.08 doctors per 1,000 people. Seventy-six percent of the population live more than 10km from the nearest health centre. More than half of births are unassisted and the MMR is 1,355 per 100,000 while the infant mortality rate is 132 per 1,000.
CAR has in recent years experienced outbreaks of meningococcal disease and shigellosis.
The country faces epidemic control challenges whenever there is a disease outbreak since most of the affected regions face population movements as a result of insecurity. Migration of people to neighbouring Chad is also cause for concern, although the last polio case was reported in 2004.
Recent vaccination campaigns have greatly reduced the threat of deadly epidemics, however.
View the WHO country health system fact sheet 2006 for CAR here.
HIV/AIDS
The Joint UN Programme on HIV/AIDS (UNAIDS, 2006) estimates that 250,000 people are HIV-positive; 24,000 people have died of AIDS and there are 140,000 AIDS orphans aged 0-17. It estimates the adult prevalence rate at 10.7 percent.
There is increased prevalence of HIV/AIDS in rural areas with a large number of people living with HIV lacking access to antiretroviral drugs. In the worst affected region, Haut-Mbomou, in the remote extreme east, the HIV prevalence rate is 13.6 percent.
Only about 3 percent of HIV-infected women and men receive antiretroviral therapy, while 16.4 percent of pregnant women are receiving treatment to reduce mother-to-child transmission.
The high cost of tests, the limited number of CD4 count machines and interruptions in the supply of antiretroviral drugs are also limiting factors in the control of HIV/AIDS.
According to the latest epidemiological data, every stratum of society is affected, with women particularly vulnerable due to poverty and the early age at which they begin having sexual relations. Street children are also vulnerable with 13 percent of children already having had sexual relations.
In a bid to control the spread of the disease, the government established the National AIDS Control Committee on 26 January 2001 to work alongside UN agencies under the coordination of UNAIDS.
The committee and the agencies are involved in activities such as the development of awareness at the political level; mobilisation of additional resources; reduction of the price of antiretroviral drugs and strengthening of actions on behalf of orphans and children made vulnerable by AIDS, and prevention of mother-to-child transmission.
For CAR’s latest progress report on HIV/AIDS to the UN General Assembly (dated January 2006-December 2007), in French, click here.
Food security
Nutritional deficiencies are widespread and affecting most age groups, according to the World Food Programme which classifies the CAR as a food-deficit country.
In some of the most agriculturally rich parts of the country, farmers have little or no access to their fields because of bandit-related insecurity. Where they do have access, there is often a huge need for seeds and tools.
The UN Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) says crop productivity has also been reduced by pests. “Cassava in particular is severely affected by mosaic disease.”
FAO quotes WFP as saying the chronic malnutrition rate in rural areas is around 41 percent.
“Across the country, there has been a reduction in agricultural practices such as beekeeping and inland fishing - activities that could help improve household nutrition and also provide income. The resumption of these practices is hampered by the lack of basic inputs.”
“FAO is seeking US$4,325,200 for emergency and rehabilitation assistance in CAR in 2008. FAO proposes a programme to bolster food production and ensure access to nutritious food for over 100,000 households in CAR. Particular attention will be paid to conflict-affected areas in the northwest region as well as HIV/AIDS-affected and female-headed households.”
For further FAO information on food security in CAR click here.
Gender issues
While women's participation in the labour force is at 69 percent, according to UNFPA, few hold managerial or technical positions with only about 7 percent of the seats in parliament being held by women.
Living conditions are precarious for women and children with lawlessness and violence commonplace. According to UNICEF, the lifetime risk of maternal death for women in CAR is 1:15.
UNFPA and other development partners are working on developing a national strategy to ensure sustainable supplies of reproductive health commodities. The government has reviewed its National Policy on Women and the Plan of Action for Promotion of Women, and has developed a National Reproductive Health Policy.
In parts of the north, some 15 percent of women are estimated to be directly affected by gender-based violence.
Click here to read an IRIN story on sexual violence.
The World Economic Forum’s Gender Gap Index covers 128 countries, but not CAR.
Human rights
A 31 January 2008 UNHCR report on CAR said: “Both main rebel groups have used child soldiers, have been responsible for widespread looting and the forced taxation of the civilian population in areas they control; and rebels in the northeast have committed killings, beatings, and rape. However, it is the government's Central African Armed Forces (Forces armées Centrafricaines, FACA) and elite Presidential Guard (Garde présidentielle, GP) that have been responsible for the majority of abuses - summary executions, unlawful killings, and village burnings - in northern CAR. Recent months have seen a marked improvement in the human rights record of both FACA and the GP, however.
“Several hundred people have been killed and over 200,000 civilians have been displaced and now live in desperate conditions in the bush. Abuses by government forces often appear to have been committed in retaliation for rebel attacks. The perpetrators of violence and abuse, the vast majority of them government soldiers, have enjoyed total impunity for acts that include war crimes,” according to the UNCHR report.
Arbitrary arrests of alleged armed group supporters, most of them civilians, long-term detention without charge or trial as well as appalling prison conditions have been reported in CAR, according to Amnesty International (AI).
AI says most prisoners in CAR are frequently denied access to legal counsel and visits by their relatives. A judicial backlog, caused by a wave of arrests since March 2006, exacerbated prison conditions.
A 19-person human rights unit in the office of the UN Peace-building Support Office in CAR (BONUCA) has not effectively monitored or reported on human rights abuses in the north.
The International Criminal Court has established an office in the CAR capital, Bangui, to investigate war crimes allegedly committed in CAR in 2002-2003.
On 22 April 2008 the UNHCR website carried an Amnesty International report that Ugandan Lord’s Resistance Army rebels had kidnapped 350 men, women and children in CAR, the Democratic Republic of Congo and Sudan “in recent weeks”. Click here to read more.
For Human Rights Watch (HRW) news on CAR click here.
For an HRW overview of human rights related events in 2007 click here.
Humanitarian Issues
There are urgent humanitarian needs among the population in the CAR, with widespread insecurity and bad roads preventing aid agencies from reaching all displaced people in the north. Because of banditry in the northwest since late December 2005, thousands remain displaced, many of whom have fled to Chad.
There has been a sharp increase in humanitarian response over the past couple of years. In 2006, there were just three international aid agencies working in CAR; by early 2008 there were more than 30.
Protection of the civilian population and provision of life-saving aid remain the most urgent humanitarian challenges.
For an overview of the current humanitarian challenges facing CAR, see IRIN’s April 2008 interview with UN Humanitarian Coordinator in CAR Tony Lanzer.
For a January 2008 ICRC report on the humanitarian situation in the northeastern town of Birao, click here.
For the latest news about humanitarian activity and developments in CAR, click here.
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| Central African Republic in figures | · Population: 4 million
· Pop. growth rate: 1.4%
· GDP per capita: US$1,224
· Pop. below poverty line: 66%
· Life expectancy: 43.7 (average for men and women)
· Infant mortality: “one in five dies before their fifth birthday” – UNICEF
· Access to med. services: 76% live more than 10km from the nearest health centre
· HIV prevalence: 10.7 %
· Access to clean water: N/A
· Access to electricity: N/A
· Literacy rate: 48.6 %
· Doctors/people: 0.08 per 1,000
· Displaced people: 295,000
· Refugees: 50,000 in Chad, 20,000 in Cameroon
· Human Development Index: 171
Sources: UNFPA, WFP, UNAIDS, UNDP, UNHCR, WHO, Ethnologue |
| Basic facts | Capital: Bangui
Languages: Sango, French
Ethnic Groups: Baya 33%, Banda 27%, Mandjia 13%, Sara 10%, Mboum 7%, M'Baka 4%, Yakoma 4%, others
Religion: Indigenous 35%, Protestant 25%, Roman Catholic 25%, Muslim 15%
Geography: vast, flat to rolling monotonous plateau; scattered hills in northeast and southwest
Border countries: Cameroon, Chad, Democratic Republic of Congo, Republic of Congo, Sudan
Natural resources: diamonds, timber, gold, hydropower, oil
Agriculture products: cotton, coffee, tobacco, cassava, yams, millet, corn, bananas; timber
Sources: WFP, UNAIDS, UNDP, UNHCR, Ethnologue, WHO |
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