Country Facts, Djibouti

Bureau of African
Affairs

May
2007



Background Note:
Djibouti



Flag of Djibouti is two equal horizontal bands of light blue at top
and light
green, with a white isosceles triangle based on the hoist
side bearing a red
five-pointed star in the
center.



PROFILE



OFFICIAL
NAME:

Republic of
Djibouti



Geography

Area: 21,883 sq. km. (8,450 sq. mi.); about the size of
Massachusetts.
Cities:
Capital--Djibouti. Other cities--Dikhil, Arta, Ali-Sabieh,
Obock,

Tadjoura.

Terrain: Coastal
desert.

Climate: Torrid and
dry.



People

Nationality: Noun and
adjective--Djiboutian(s).

Population (est.): Between 466,900 and
650,000.

Annual growth rate (2005 est.):
2.6%.

Ethnic groups: Somali, Afar, Ethiopian, Arab, French, and
Italian.

Religions: Muslim 94%, Christian
6%.

Languages: French and Arabic (official); Somali and Afar widely
used.
Education:
Literacy--46.2%.

Health: Infant mortality rate--100 to 150/1,000. Life expectancy
(2005 est.)
--43.1
years.

Work force: Low employment rate; estimates run well under 50% of the
work
force. The largest employers are the
Government of Djibouti, including

telecommunications and electricity; Port of Djibouti; and airport. The
U.S.
Government, including the military camp and the embassy,
is the second
largest employer.
Able-bodied unemployed population (est.
2006)--60%.



Government

Type:
Republic.

Constitution: Ratified September 1992 by
referendum.

Independence: June 27,
1977.

Branches: Executive--president. Legislative--65-member parliament,
cabinet,
prime minister. Judicial--based on French civil law
system, traditional
practices, and
Islamic
law.

Administrative subdivisions: 6 cercles (districts)--Ali-Sabieh, Arta,
Dikhil,
Djibouti, Obock, and
Tadjoura.

Political parties: People's Rally for Progress (RPP) established in
1981; New
Democratic Party (PRD) and the National Democratic Party
(PND) were both
established in 1992; and the
Front For The Restoration of Unity and Democracy
(FRUD) was legally
recognized in 1994. Five additional parties
were

established in 2002: Djibouti Development Party (PDD); Peoples
Social
Democratic Party
(PPSD); Republican Alliance for Democracy (ARD); Union for

Democracy and Justice (UDJ); Movement for Democratic Renewal
(MRD).

Suffrage: Universal at
18.

National holiday: Independence Day, June 27
(1977).



Economy

GDP (2006 est.): $768
million.

Adjusted per capita income: $850 per capita for expatriates, $450
for

Djiboutians.

Natural resources: Minerals (salt, perlite, gypsum, limestone) and
energy
resources (geothermal and
solar).

Agriculture (less than 3% of GDP): Products--livestock, fishing, and
limited
commercial crops, including fruits and
vegetables.

Industry: Types--banking and insurance (12.5% of GDP), public
administration
(22% of GDP), construction and public works,
manufacturing, commerce, and

agriculture.

Trade (2004 est.): Imports--$987 million: consists of basic
commodities,
including food and beverages,
pharmaceutical drugs, transport equipment,

chemicals, and petroleum products. Exports--$250 million: re-exports,
hides
and skins, and coffee (in-transit). Major markets
(2004)--France, Ethiopia,
Somalia, India, China, and Saudi
Arabia and other Arabian
peninsula

countries.



PEOPLE

About two-thirds of the Republic of Djibouti's 650,000 inhabitants
live in
the capital city. The indigenous population is
divided between the majority
Somalis (predominantly of the Issa
tribe, with minority Issaq and Gadabursi
representation) and
the Afars (Danakils). All are Cushitic-speaking peoples,
and nearly
all are Muslim. Among the 15,000 foreigners residing in Djibouti,
the
French are the most numerous. Among the French are 3,000
troops.



HISTORY

The Republic of Djibouti gained its independence on June 27, 1977. It
is the
successor to French Somaliland (later called the French
Territory of the
Afars and Issas), which was
created in the first half of the 19th century as
a result of French
interest in the Horn of Africa. However, the history of

Djibouti, recorded in poetry and songs of its nomadic peoples, goes
back
thousands of years to a time when
Djiboutians traded hides and skins for the
perfumes and spices of
ancient Egypt, India, and China. Through
close
contacts with the
Arabian Peninsula for more than 1,000 years, the Somali and
Afar
tribes in this region became the first on the African continent to
adopt

Islam.



It was Rochet d'Hericourt's exploration into Shoa (1839-42) that
marked the
beginning of French interest in the African shores
of the Red Sea. Further
exploration by Henri Lambert,
French Consular Agent at Aden, and Captain

Fleuriot de Langle led to a treaty of friendship and assistance
between
France and the sultans of
Raheita, Tadjoura, and Gobaad, from whom the French
purchased the
anchorage of Obock
(1862).



Growing French interest in the area took place against a backdrop of
British
activity in Egypt and the opening of the Suez Canal in 1869.
In 1884-85,
France expanded its protectorate
to include the shores of the Gulf of

Tadjoura and the Somaliland. Boundaries of the protectorate, marked
out in
1897 by France and Emperor Menelik II of Ethiopia,
were affirmed further by
agreements with Ethiopian Emperor
Haile Selassie I in 1945 and
1954.



The administrative capital was moved from Obock to Djibouti in 1892.
In 1896,
Djibouti was named French Somaliland. Djibouti, which has a
good natural
harbor and ready access to the
Ethiopian highlands, attracted trade caravans
crossing East Africa as
well as Somali settlers from the south.
The

Franco-Ethiopian railway, linking Djibouti to the heart of Ethiopia,
was
begun in 1897 and reached Addis Ababa in
June 1917, further facilitating the
increase of
trade.



During the Italian invasion and occupation of Ethiopia in the 1930s
and
during World War II, constant
border skirmishes occurred between French and
Italian forces.
The area was ruled by the Vichy (French) government from the
fall of
France until December 1942, and fell under British blockade during

that period. Free French and the Allied forces recaptured Djibouti at
the end
of 1942. A local battalion from Djibouti participated in the
liberation of
France in
1944.



On July 22, 1957, the colony was reorganized to give the people
considerable
self-government. On the same day, a decree applying the
Overseas Reform Act
(Loi Cadre) of June 23, 1956, established a
territorial assembly that elected
eight of its members to an executive
council. Members of the executive

council were responsible for one or more of the territorial services
and
carried the title of minister. The
council advised the French-appointed

governor
general.



In a September 1958 constitutional referendum, French Somaliland
opted to
join the French community as an overseas
territory. This act entitled the
region to
representation by one deputy and one senator in the
French
Parliament,
and one counselor in the French Union
Assembly.



The first elections to the territorial assembly were held on November
23,
1958, under a system of proportional
representation. In the next assembly
elections
(1963), a new electoral law was enacted. Representation
was
abolished in exchange
for a system of straight plurality vote based on lists
submitted by
political parties in seven designated districts. Ali
Aref
Bourhan, allegedly of
Turkish origin, was selected to be the president of the
executive
council. French President Charles de Gaulle's August 1966 visit to

Djibouti was marked by 2 days of public demonstrations by Somalis
demanding
independence. On September 21, 1966, Louis Saget,
appointed governor general
of the territory after the demonstrations,
announced the French Government's
decision to hold a referendum to
determine whether the people would remain
within the
French Republic or become independent. In March 1967, 60% chose to

continue the territory's association with
France.



In July of that year, a directive from Paris formally changed the
name of the
region to the French Territory of Afars and Issas. The
directive also
reorganized
the governmental structure of the territory, making the senior

French representative, formerly the governor general, a high
commissioner. In
addition, the executive council was redesignated as
the council of

government, with nine
members.



In 1975, the French Government began to accommodate increasingly
insistent
demands for independence. In June 1976, the
territory's citizenship law,
which favored
the Afar minority, was revised to reflect more closely
the
weight of the Issa Somali. The electorate
voted for independence in a May
1977 referendum.
The Republic of Djibouti was established on June 27, 1977,
and
Hassan Gouled Aptidon became the country's first president. In 1981, he

was again elected president of Djibouti. He was re-elected,
unopposed, to a
second 6-year term in April 1987 and to a third
6-year term in May 1993
multiparty
elections.



In early 1992, the constitution permitted the legalization of four
political
parties for a period of 10 years, after which a complete
multiparty system
would be installed. By the time of the
December 1992 national assembly

elections, only three had qualified. They were the Rassemblement
Populaire
Pour le Progres (People's Rally for
Progress--RPP), which was the only legal
party from 1981 until 1992;
the Parti du Renouveau Democratique (The Party
for
Democratic Renewal--PRD); and the Parti National Democratique (National

Democratic Party--PND). Only the RPP and the PRD contested the
national
assembly elections, and the
PND withdrew, claiming that there were too many
unanswered
questions on the conduct of the elections and too
many

opportunities for government fraud. The RPP won all 65 seats in the
national
assembly, with a turnout of less than 50% of the
electorate.



In early November 1991, civil war erupted in Djibouti between the
government
and a predominantly Afar rebel group, the Front for the
Restoration of Unity
and Democracy (FRUD). The FRUD signed a peace
accord with the government in
December 1994, ending the
conflict. Two FRUD members were made cabinet

members, and in the presidential elections of 1999 the FRUD
campaigned in
support of the
RPP.



In 1999, Ismail Omar Guelleh--President Hassan Gouled Aptidon's chief
of
staff, head of security, and key adviser
for over 20 years--was elected to
the presidency as the
RPP candidate. He received 74% of the vote, with the

other 26% going to opposition candidate Moussa Ahmed Idriss, of the
Unified
Djiboutian Opposition (ODU). For the first time since
independence, no group
boycotted the election. Moussa Ahmed Idriss
and the ODU later challenged the
results based on election
"irregularities" and the assertion
that

"foreigners" had voted in various districts of the capital;
however,

international and locally based observers considered the election to
be
generally fair, and cited only minor
technical difficulties. Ismail Omar
Guelleh
took the oath of office as the second President of the Republic of

Djibouti on May 8, 1999, with the support of an alliance between the
RPP and
the government-recognized section of the Afar-led
FRUD.



In February 2000, another branch of FRUD signed a peace accord with
the
government. On May 12, 2001,
President Ismail Omar Guelleh presided over the
signing of what was
termed the final peace accord officially ending
the
decade-long civil war between the
government and the armed faction of the
FRUD. The
peace accord successfully completed the peace process begun
on
February 7, 2000 in Paris. Ahmed Dini
Ahmed represented the
FRUD.



GOVERNMENT AND POLITICAL
CONDITIONS

Djibouti is a republic whose electorate approved the current
constitution in
September 1992. Many laws and decrees from before
independence remain in

effect.



In the presidential election held April 8, 2005 Ismail Omar Guelleh
was
re-elected to a second 6-year term
at the head of a multi-party coalition
that
included the FRUD and other major parties. A loose coalition
of
opposition parties
again boycotted the election. Currently, political power
is
shared by a Somali president and an Afar prime minister, with an
Afar
career diplomat as Foreign Minister and
other cabinet posts roughly divided.
However, Issas are predominate
in the government, civil service, and the

ruling party. That, together with a shortage of non-government
employment,
has bred resentment and continued political
competition between the Somali
Issas and the Afars. In
March 2006, Djibouti held its first
regional
elections
and began implementing a decentralization plan. The
broad

pro-government coalition, including FRUD candidates, again ran unopposed
when
the government refused to meet opposition preconditions for
participation. A
nationwide voter registration campaign is now
underway in advance of the
scheduled 2008
parliamentary
elections.



Djibouti has its own armed forces, including a small army, which
grew
significantly with the
start of the civil war in 1991. With the 2001 final
peace
accord between the government and the Afar-dominated FRUD, the armed

forces have been downsized. The country's security is supplemented by
a
formal security accord with the
Government of France, which guarantees

Djibouti's territorial integrity against foreign incursions. France
maintains
one of its largest military bases outside France in
Djibouti. There are some
3,000 French troops stationed in Djibouti,
including units of the famed
French
Foreign
Legion.



The right to own property is respected in Djibouti. The government
has
reorganized the labor unions.
While there have been open elections of union
leaders in the
past, some labor leaders allege interference in their internal

elections. Others voice opposition to newly-implemented labor laws that
apply
to new jobs created in free zones and that are less favorable to
labor.



In 2002, following a broad national debate, Djibouti enacted a new
"Family
Law" enhancing the protection of women and
children, unifying legal treatment
of all women, and replacing Sharia.
The government established
a

minister-designate for women's affairs and is engaged in an ongoing
effort to
increase public recognition of women's rights and to ensure
enforcement. In
2007, it began establishing a network of new
counseling offices to assist
women seeking to
understand and protect their rights. Women in Djibouti enjoy
a higher
public status than in many other Islamic countries. The government

is leading efforts to stop illegal and abusive traditional
practices,
including female
genital mutilation. As the result of a three-year effort,

the percentage of girls attending primary school increased significantly and

is now more than 50%. However, women's rights and family planning
continue to
face difficult challenges, many stemming from acute
poverty in both rural and
urban areas. With female ministers and
members of parliament, the presence of
women in government has
increased. Despite the gains, education of girls

still lags behind boys, and employment opportunities are better for
male

applicants.



Principal Government
Officials

President--Ismail Omar
Guelleh

Prime Minister--Dileita Mohamed
Dileita

Foreign Affairs--Mahamoud Ali
Youssouf

Ambassador to the United Nations and the United States--Roble Olhaye
Oudine



Djibouti's mission to the UN is located at 866 UN Plaza, Suite 4011,
New
York, NY 10017 (tel. 212-753-3163).
Djibouti's embassy in Washington is

located at Suite 515, 1156 15th Street, NW, Washington, DC 20005 (tel.
202-
331-0270; fax
202-331-0302).



ECONOMY

Djibouti's economy depends largely on its proximity to the large
Ethiopian
market and a large foreign expatriate
community. Its main economic activities
are the Port of Djibouti, the
banking sector, the airport, and the operation
of the Addis
Ababa-Djibouti railroad. During the "lost decade" following the
brunt
of its civil war (1991-94), there was a significant diversion
of
government budgetary resources
from developmental and social services to

military needs. However, from 2001 on, Djibouti has become a magnet
for
private sector capital investment,
attracting inflows that now average more
than $200 million. It
has also significantly improved its finances, paying

current salaries, maintaining reserves, and generating a growth rate in 2006

of approximately 4.5%. Djibouti has become a significant regional
banking
hub, with approximately $600 million in
dollar deposits. Its currency, the
Djiboutian Franc, was
linked to the dollar (and to gold) in 1949
and
appreciated twice
over the interim when the dollar was devalued and then

freed to float. Agriculture and industry are little developed, in
part due to
the harsh climate, high production costs, unskilled labor,
and limited
natural resources.
Mineral deposits exist in the country, but with
the
exception of an extraordinary
salt deposit at Lac Asal, the lowest point in
Africa, they have
not been exploited. The arid soil is unproductive--89% is

desert wasteland, 10% is pasture, and 1% is forested. Deforestation
for
charcoal is a significant problem,
as it now replaces expensive imported
cooking
gas in many urban homes. Services and commerce provide most of the

gross domestic
product.



Djibouti's most important economic asset is its strategic location on
the
busy shipping route between the Mediterranean
Sea and the Indian Ocean.
Roughly 60%
of all commercial ships in the world use its waters from the Red
Sea
through the Bab-el-Mandeb strait and into the Gulf of Aden and the
Indian
Ocean. Its old port is an increasingly important transshipment
point for
containers as well as a destination
port for Ethiopian trade. Last year

alone, private investment in the old port totaled approximately $50 million.

Djibouti is now in the second of three phases of a multi-year, $800
million,
privately-financed project to build a new port with fueling,
container, and
free zone components. The old port will continue
serving as a general

shipping, bulk cargo, and break-bulk facility and also as the host of a
small
French naval
facility.



Business soared at the Port of Djibouti when hostilities between
Eritrea and
Ethiopia denied Ethiopia access to the Eritrean Port of
Assab. Djibouti
became the only
significant port for landlocked Ethiopia, handling all its

imports and exports, including huge shipments of U.S. food aid in
2000 during
the drought and famine. In 2000, Dubai Ports World took
over management of
Djibouti's port and later its customs
and airport operations. The result has
been a significant increase in
investment, efficiency, activity, and port

revenues. The Addis Ababa-Djibouti railroad is the only line serving central

and southeastern Ethiopia. The single-track railway--a prime source
of
employment--occupies a
prominent place in Ethiopia's internal distribution

system for domestic commodities such as cement, cotton textiles,
sugar,
cereals, and charcoal. A weekly
train from Ethiopia brings in most of

Djibouti's fresh fruits and vegetables. In March 2006, the
Governments of
Ethiopia and Djibouti (which co-own
the railway) selected the South African
firm COMAZAR to manage
the line. They are still in negotiations over the

management agreement. In addition, the European Union is considering
a $100
million project to upgrade a portion of the rail
line.



Principal exports from the region transiting Djibouti are coffee,
salt, live
animals, hides, dried beans, cereals other agricultural
products, and wax.
Djibouti itself has few exports, and
the majority of its imports come from
France. Most
imports are consumed in Djibouti, and the remainder go
to
Ethiopia and northwestern
Somalia. Djibouti's unfavorable balance of trade is
offset partially
by invisible earnings such as transit taxes and harbor dues.
In 2001,
U.S. exports to Djibouti totaled $18.7 million, while U.S. imports

from Djibouti were about $1
million.



The city of Djibouti has the only paved airport in the republic.
Djibouti has
one of the most liberal economic regimes in Africa, with
almost unrestricted
banking and commerce
sectors.



FOREIGN
RELATIONS

Military and economic agreements with France provide continued
security and
economic assistance. Links with Arab states and
East Asian states, Japan and
China in particular, also are welcome.
Djibouti is a member of the Arab

League, as well as the African Union, the Inter-Governmental Authority
on
Development (IGAD), and the Common Market for
Eastern and Southern Africa

(COMESA).



Djibouti is greatly affected by events in Somalia and Ethiopia, so
relations
are important and, at times, delicate. The 1991 falls of
the Siad Barre and
Mengistu governments in Somalia and
Ethiopia, respectively, caused Djibouti
to face national
security threats due to instability in the
neighboring
states and a massive influx
of refugees estimated at 100,000 from Somalia and
Ethiopia. In 2000,
after 3 years of insufficient rain, 50,000 drought victims
entered
Djibouti. In 1996, a revitalized organization of seven East African

states, the Inter-Governmental Authority on Development (IGAD),
established
its secretariat in Djibouti. IGA
Country Facts, Djibouti