Where is the Hippo?

In the realm of high-stakes problem-solving, we often speak of "The elephant in the room"—that looming, undeniable presence that everyone sees but no one addresses. Yet perhaps we should be asking a different question: "Where is the hippo?"

I encountered such a hippo while leading a strategy mission in Niger's Tillabéri region. We had gathered with community representatives to discuss violent extremism, seated in a circle reminiscent of ancient storytelling traditions. As expected, the dialogue circled familiar themes: poverty's stubborn grip, the mirage of economic opportunity, governance's distant promise.

Among the participants sat a farmer, his weathered face holding decades of wisdom. While others spoke, he remained silent, offering only occasional knowing smiles—the kind that suggested he had witnessed this performance before. His demeanor spoke of someone who held a truth yet unspoken.

Intrigued by his quiet certainty, I invited him to share his thoughts. "The real problem in my village," he said, gently upending our carefully constructed dialogue, "isn't violent extremist groups. It's the hippos."

Laughter rippled through the group—nervous, dismissive—but something in his eyes made me raise my hand for a second. I sensed something profound in his words and encouraged him to continue.

His village, he explained, rests along the Niger River's banks, where climate change has been rewriting ancient patterns. As water levels retreat, hippos—those river giants—find their world shrinking. They venture closer to human settlements, emerging under cover of darkness when the village sleeps. Their nightly raids leave devastation: market gardens trampled, watermelon fields reduced to pulp, months of careful cultivation erased before dawn, when the destruction greets farmers.

In the light of day, farmers survey their ruined fields and, seeing familiar patterns of destruction, point fingers at pastoralist neighbors whose herds could cause similar damage. Accusations flow as freely as the river once did. Trust erodes like the receding riverbank.

Then came a day when accusations turned to blood—a pastoralist's life lost in heated confrontation. Vengeance called to vengeance. A cousin with connections to regional criminal networks was summoned, bringing allies whose shadows stretched toward violent extremist groups. And just like that, violent extremism took root in soil fertilized by hippo footprints.

The extremists weren't the cause; they were the opportunistic latecomers, stepping through a door that hungry hippos had unknowingly opened. "Had someone addressed the hippo problem," he concluded, "we might have been spared the extremists."

His testimony illuminated a crucial blind spot in our approach to conflict prevention. While we craft elaborate strategies to counter radicalization, the real catalyst might be as seemingly unrelated as displaced hippos searching for food. Symptoms are vigorously treated while overlooking the hippo - the root cause – continuing its nightly feeding missions that set off a cascade of human reactions.

The hippos continue their nocturnal raids, moving from village to village, driven by the same primal need to survive in an increasingly hostile climate. This reality echoes across the Sahel, where environmental changes ripple through human communities in unexpected ways.

This encounter fundamentally shifted my understanding of crisis prevention. While "the elephant in the room" demands immediate attention through its sheer visibility, it's often the hippo—silent, unseen, yet profoundly disruptive—that truly needs addressing.

The next time you find yourself designing a strategy, shaping policy, or attempting to solve a seemingly intractable problem, look beyond the obvious. Ask yourself: Where is the hippo? What hidden forces are at play? And most critically—what can be done before the next night time feeding mission?

Because sometimes, the most important stakeholder in a conflict isn't at the negotiating table, focus group discussions, community dialogues, peace caravans, etc… Sometimes, it's submerged in a shrinking river, waiting for nightfall. It is high time we found “the hippo in the house”.

#P/CVE #Stabilisation #ConflictPrevention #ClimatePVE #CommunityInsights