botswana/namibia - Cour international de Justice

y reference to the facts on the ground and the scientific evidence, the Court is respectfully
referred to Chapter 6 of this Counter-Memorial).
(B) Namibia's Case
251. In contrast to this straightforward approach, the Namibian Memorial deploys its
scientific expert and evidence in a manner which obfuscates the task of the Court. The Chobe
River is a well-recognised and long established perennial river and the task of the Court is to
determine the main channel in that recognised river along which, in accordance with Article 3
of the Anglo-German Agreement of 1890, the boundary line 'descends'. Indeed, since the facts
on the ground and every official, surveyor or hydrologist prior to Namibia's scientific expert
has, on consideration of the question, and, on inspection, pronounced that the northern
channel is the main channel, Botswana submits that recourse to scientific evidence is
superfluous, or at most supplementary.
252. The Namibian Memorial, however, far from referring to scientific evidence to
supplement the facts on the ground, displays a mass of unsupported and unscientific
assertions to advance a highly esoteric and opportunistic definition of the main channel.
253. The Namibian Memorial adopts the definition of 'main channel' of the Chobe on the
basis of a thesis advanced by Professor Alexander as follows:-
"The dispute concerns the reach of the Chobe River at Kasikili Island. The length of this reach
of the river is only four kilometres compared with a total boundary length of more than 300
kilometres. Logic requires that the method used for determining the location of the boundary
at Kasikili Island must be capable of being consistently and successfully applied to the whole
length of the boundary along the Chobe river as identified in the 1890 Treaty. The only
definition of the main channel of the Chobe River that can be successfully applied to the
whole length of the Chobe River, including reaches of the river that have ephemeral, seasonal,
or permanent islands in them, is the channel which conveys the largest proportion of the
annual flow of the river. The southern channel meets the requirement while the northern
channel does not." (Memorial, Vol. VI, Part 1, Expert Report, p.4, para. 1.8).
254. The Namibian identification of the main channel is entirely dependent on a thesis put
forward by Professor W.J.R. Alexander (formerly Chief of the Division of Hydrology and
Manager of Scientific Services of the South African Department of Water Affairs)1, whose
Report in Vol. VI of the Namibian Memorial is made an integral part of the Memorial and
"provides the technical and scientific foundations" of the Namibian case. (Namibian
Memorial, p.6, para.20).
[1. The South African Department of Water Affairs supplied two experts, Mr. J.B. Botha and Mr.G.R.van der
Merwe, who participated in the Joint Chobe River Boundary Survey of 1985 which identified the northern
channel as the main channel,- "the main channel of the Chobe River now passes Sidudu/Kasikili Island to the
west and north of it." Botswana Memorial, Volume III, Annex 48, p.384 at 387-8.]
255. A startling aspect of that thesis is Professor Alexander's identification of the course of
the southern channel, not as shown on all aerial photographs, maps and even satellite
imageries, but as "a broader overlying channel", superimposed over the western third of the
present Kasikili/Sedudu Island. The presence of this 'Alexandrine channel' is identified as
Zone d in Diagram 4, Sheet 17, Namibian Memorial, Vol.VI, Expert Report, part 2.