In the light of the failure of the UN to deal with all Africa‟s security requirements, the UN and some regional organisations such as the AU and the EU have developed what is referred to as „hybrid peacekeeping‟. This implies that regional organisations initially take the lead in peace intervention operations, until the hybrid force eventually transitions into a full-blown UN multi-functional peacekeeping and peacebuilding mission. This implies essentially that the regional organisation will run the day-to-day operations, whilst the UN will have overall control of the mission.
The trend towards hybrid peacekeeping has highlighted several problems that were not initially appreciated. One of the primary problems is that of sidelining the UN in favour of hegemonic unilateral initiatives. The UN, as the most representative supra-national body, should not be allowed to become obsolete in the global peacekeeping agenda. Despite its shortcomings, the UN‟s operations are still observed as legitimate and viewed as having a significant role to play in peacekeeping, peace enforcement and peacebuilding. According to Othieno and Samasuwo (2007:23), the UN not only has the moral high ground or impartiality that other organisations may not necessarily have, but also has certain clear comparative advantages in setting global security standards, humanitarian assistance and development.
The issue of legitimacy of hybrid operations have also not been finalised and hence the legitimacy and legality of certain peace missions, although they might enjoy the support of the AU or UN, may be disputed. Disputes might emerge between donors and regional organisations over who should play the leading or bigger role in a particular region or peace mission. By virtue of their financial muscle, donors may wish to smuggle in their own political agendas. Disputes might also arise over who will have the authority to implement future peace missions or ceasefires – especially in hybrid operations in which the UN plays a secondary role or only enters a particular mission at a later stage to legitimise unilaterally initiated missions.
Although it is evident that rich countries have borne the burden of the UN‟s overall budget, it is also true that some of these countries have attempted to use the „power of the purse‟ to control the way in which the UN operates in general. In addition, there is a tendency that developed countries prefer deploying their citizens in missions outside the African continent. This has resulted in the situation that African missions have had to rely on an increase in the number of African and Asian personnel, while places such as the Balkans and the Middle East have relied almost purely on Western military personnel (Gowan and Johnstone, 2007:2). According to Sidhu (2006:32–37), this „peacekeeping apartheid‟ has strengthened the perception that powerful donor countries prefer „big leagues, big budget, advanced technology, war fighting roles‟ and that they leave the UN and other continental bodies such as the AU to clean up the mess in African peacekeeping theatres.
In the light of the above, critics of modern peacekeeping operations have likened them to a new form of neo-colonialism. According to Adebajo (2007:6), the five permanent members of the UNSC have tended to maintain an ambiguous attitude towards regional organisations, by rejecting to fund them and then recognising them
while attempting to maintain control over certain missions. This point is supported by the fact that some of the UNSC veto-wielding members have shown greater willingness to sanction deployments of peace missions only in their former colonial or geo-strategic spheres of influence. Examples are the British in Sierra Leone, the Americans in Liberia and Somalia, and the French in Côte d‟Ivoire. In reaction, some critics have stated that some peacekeeping missions have thus provided the opportunity for former colonial powers to interfere in the internal affairs of their former colonies, especially against unpopular governments, by motivating their actions by using the newly adopted controversial norms of intervention in international affairs, such as the concept of „the responsibility to protect‟. There is no doubt that such perception contributed to the attack on French peacekeepers in the Côte d‟Ivoire in November 2004 (Othieno and Samasuwo, 2007:34).
In order to meet the implementation challenge of integrated and hybrid missions, UN-contributing states cannot continue their ad hoc, piecemeal and fragmented responses to complex emergencies by piecing together makeshift committees or teams for each new crisis. What is needed is an overall political framework and institutional base, backed by permanent staff for developing plans and procedures for integrated civil-military efforts. The current absence of any specific coordinating entity for reconstruction within Africa‟s peace and security architecture, for example, contributes to the clouding of priorities, the ineffective use of resources and their reactive nature of responses. As such, it would be useful to establish lead agencies that can provide clear strategic direction, and identify key gaps and clarify roles and responsibilities for responding to conflict and assisting with reconstruction. In order to improve integration, such agencies should be endowed with sufficient authority to bring together all the relevant military and civilian agencies when a crisis emerges. In this regard, the establishment of a standing civilian corps for reconstruction will require conducting and inventory of existing capabilities and support technologies or to determine human resource, organisational, and technical gaps for civilian reconstruction-related activities. Gaps for stability operations will invariably be addressed as Africa has many trained and experienced military peacekeepers, but very few civilian experts (Gueli and Liebenberg, 2006b:3).
The AU has also acknowledged the requirement for improved integrated systems that are required between the military and civilian components involved in post-conflict reconstruction and development. During the 5th Meeting of the African Chiefs of Defence Staff and Heads of Security in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia on 24–28 March 2008, the AU decided that a working group of experts should be appointed to, inter alia, consider “the need for appropriate terminology (to be used by the AU)
to reflect the multi-dimensional and multi-functional mechanisms, given that the expressions „Standby Force‟ and „Standby Brigade‟ have exclusive military connotations (AU, 2008:2).