{"id":955693,"date":"2026-05-12T22:09:15","date_gmt":"2026-05-12T22:09:15","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/955693\/"},"modified":"2026-05-12T22:09:15","modified_gmt":"2026-05-12T22:09:15","slug":"can-france-redefine-its-relationship-with-africa","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/955693\/","title":{"rendered":"Can France redefine its relationship with Africa?"},"content":{"rendered":"

When French President Emmanuel Macron<\/strong> took to the stage at the Africa Forward summit yesterday, the audience may not have expected a scolding.<\/p>\n

\u201cHey! Hey! Hey! I\u2019m sorry guys, but it\u2019s impossible to \u2026 have people \u2026 coming here making a speech with such a noise,\u201d he said. \u201cThis is a total lack of respect.\u201d<\/p>\n

Macron\u2019s harsh words directed at the crowd, somewhat ironically, come as he tries to rebuild ties with Africa. The French leader met with<\/a> over 30 African leaders in Nairobi on Monday as the Africa Forward summit, co-hosted by Kenyan President William Ruto<\/strong>, gets underway this week. It is the first time France has held such an event in an English-speaking nation, and it is intended to showcase a \u201crenewed partnership\u201d between France and Africa built not on shared colonial history, but on<\/a> economic partnerships.<\/p>\n

To that end, Macron announced<\/a> $27 billion in investments, including $16 billion in private and public funds from French entities and over $10 billion from African investors. The funds will support energy transition, digital and AI, the ocean economy<\/a> \u2014 key to African coastal states \u2014 and agriculture, creating 250,000 direct jobs in France and on the continent. Macron also touted Europe<\/a> as Africa\u2019s \u201cethical partner,\u201d<\/a> which \u201cdefends the international order, effective multilateralism, the rule of law, free and open trade.\u201d<\/p>\n

The pitch comes as France tries to regain some of the economic, military, and political influence it has lost across the continent, most notably to Russia and China. Now, France is trying to reposition itself as a supporter of African economic ambitions. It has already grown its imports<\/a> from Africa by a quarter between 2021 and 2024, but Macron is pulling out all the stops to take Paris<\/a> from colonial patron to commercial partner \u2014 and overcome a controversial legacy. <\/p>\n

The rise and fall of \u201cFran\u00e7afrique.\u201d <\/strong>From the 1800s to the mid-1900s, France colonized nearly 1.8 million square miles<\/a> of the African continent. After decolonization began in the 1950s, France maintained influence across many of these nations for the next half-century. The system became known as \u201cFran\u00e7afrique\u201d<\/a> \u2014 a term coined in 1945 that implied a mix of military protection, political dependency, and economic access.<\/p>\n

Paris stationed thousands of troops<\/a> across Africa, guaranteed the currencies of several former colonies through the CFA franc system<\/a>, intervened<\/a> repeatedly in domestic conflicts to preserve political stability, and cultivated close ties with African political elites. France\u2019s military and financial support gave French companies privileged access<\/a> to African oil, infrastructure, and telecommunications industries.<\/p>\n

By the end of the century, however, Fran\u00e7afrique came to symbolize corruption, patronage, and political interference. French economist, historian, and activist Fran\u00e7ois-Xavier Verschave<\/strong> famously dubbed<\/a> Fran\u00e7afrique<\/a> \u201cthe longest scandal in the Republic,\u201d in which French companies funded repressive regimes in exchange for access, and the military intervened to stabilize authoritarian governments<\/a> that were friendly to French interests \u2014 but not necessarily to their own people.<\/p>\n

Repudiation of France opens the door to Russia.<\/strong> The breaking point came in the 2020s, with a series of coups<\/a> across the Sahel that effectively ended the French military presence. In Mali, a military junta seized power in 2020 and 2021; Burkina Faso followed in 2022, and Niger in 2023. In 2025, Mali accused France of fomenting a counter-coup<\/a>, something Paris denies<\/a>, and ordered all French troops out of the country; Operation Barkhane<\/a> \u2014 France\u2019s flagship anti-terrorism mission in the Sahel \u2014 effectively collapsed. Chad then terminated its defense pact<\/a> with Paris in late 2024, and in early 2025, the Ivory Coast announced the withdrawal<\/a> of French troops, while Senegal forced France to close<\/a> its last major permanent military base on the continent.<\/p>\n

Moscow seized the moment and stepped into the vacuum<\/a> in the Sahel. Through Wagner Group mercenaries \u2014 and later the Kremlin-controlled Africa Corps after the death of Wagner leader Yevgeny Prigozhin<\/strong> in August 2023 \u2014 Russia embedded itself with the juntas in Mali, Burkina Faso, and Niger, promising security and an end to Islamic insurgencies. Russian operatives trained soldiers, protected regimes, supplied weapons, and amplified anti-French narratives on social media and state-linked media outlets in Africa.<\/p>\n

But Russia\u2019s security model has not stabilized the region. In 2025, Malian forces and Russian paramilitary groups reportedly killed more civilians<\/a> than jihadist groups themselves. And recently, Russian-backed forces in Mali suffered major losses<\/a> after coordinated attacks by Tuareg separatists and jihadists \u2014 and saw their fighters jeered in the streets<\/a>.<\/p>\n

China wins economically. <\/strong>If Russia sought to displace France militarily, China eclipsed it economically. Over the past decade, Beijing has financed ports, railways, highways, dams, airports, telecom systems, and energy projects across Africa through its Belt and Road Initiative. China has also leveraged the anti-colonial sentiment to its <\/a>advantage, portraying France\u2019s involvement as nostalgic and paternalistic, while framing its own engagement as forward-looking and commercial.<\/p>\n

And that engagement is substantial. At the 2024 China-Africa Cooperation Summit, Chinese President Xi Jinping <\/strong>pledged nearly $51 billion<\/a> in new African financing over three years, together with infrastructure projects and the creation of 1 million jobs. Beijing is also expanding trade deals with the continent, recently dropping tariffs<\/a> on imports from all African nations, except Eswatini, which has diplomatic ties to Taiwan. Beijing also deploys soft power through educational opportunities<\/a>; In 2020, China offered 12,000 scholarships<\/a> to African students, eclipsing the 600 offered by France. As of this year, 16% of China\u2019s foreign students<\/a> now hail from the continent.<\/p>\n

But China has also been criticized<\/a> for environmental degradation and rights violations in its pursuit of African resources. Last year, when a toxic spill<\/a> from a Chinese-owned mine in Zambia poisoned the country\u2019s most important waterway, Beijing was accused<\/a> of covering up the catastrophe. During this week\u2019s summit, Macron also accused<\/a> China of operating \u201caccording to a predatory logic: it does the processing at home,\u201d and creates \u201cdependencies with the rest of the world.\u201d<\/p>\n

Macron\u2019s Africa strategy: two steps forward, one step back? <\/strong>Macron has made redefining France\u2019s relationship with Africa a priority \u2014 with mixed success. In 2017, he laid out a new Africa doctrine<\/a> built on three pillars: apologizing for colonial wrongs, shifting aid toward small business development, and broadening French alliances beyond its former colonies. The \u00c9lys\u00e9e has since pursued several symbolic initiatives, including returning looted artwork<\/a>, seeking forgiveness for France\u2019s role in the 1994 genocide in Rwanda<\/a> and a political assassination<\/a> in Algeria, and launching a new series of France-Africa summits<\/a>. <\/p>\n

But despite these efforts, the coups kept coming \u2014 as did the gripes from Paris. In January 2025, Macron complained publicly<\/a> that Sahel governments had \u201cforgotten to thank\u201d France for stopping Islamist insurgencies, adding that \u201c it will come in time.\u201d He struck a similarly combative tone during a December 2024 visit to the cyclone-devastated island of Mayotte, a French territory off Africa\u2019s southeastern coast, where he lambasted<\/a> residents angry about the slow pace of aid, saying: \u201cIf it wasn\u2019t for France, you\u2019d be 10,000 times deeper in shit.\u201d <\/p>\n

Missteps like these will not help France\u2019s cause or overcome the legacy of colonialism \u2014 a legacy not shared by France\u2019s competitors. But investments like those made at the Summit, coupled with the promise of ethical guardrails, might convince African leaders to give France a second chance.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"When French President Emmanuel Macron took to the stage at the Africa Forward summit yesterday, the audience may…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":955694,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5309],"tags":[2740,266777,11246,2000,299,36,43,266778,261752],"class_list":{"0":"post-955693","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-france","8":"tag-africa","9":"tag-africa-forward-summit","10":"tag-analysis","11":"tag-eu","12":"tag-europe","13":"tag-france","14":"tag-macron","15":"tag-tasha-kheiriddin","16":"tag-william-ruto"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@uk\/116563893747718657","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/955693","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=955693"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/955693\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/955694"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=955693"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=955693"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=955693"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}