Emmanuel Macron in Africa: A visit to minefields

The visit could have been a welcome breather

Emmanuel Macron in Africa: A visit to minefields

The visit could have been a welcome breather. A few days of total change of scenery and equatorial climate to forget the worries of Paris and the strikes against the pension reform. But at the moment, for Emmanuel Macron, the ground seems even more mined in Africa than in a procession of the CGT. Expelled from Mali and the Central African Republic, on the back foot everywhere else, especially in Burkina, France finds itself more than ever contested on the continent. The contagion against France threatens to spread to Chad and Niger, while the imperialist powers, from Russia to China via Turkey, gain in presence and influence. Rarely have relations between Africa and France seemed so tormented.

It is in this unstable context that the president begins an official tour of four Central African countries that he had never visited before, from Wednesday until Sunday. For his second term, the tenant of the Élysée wishes to put "tonic emphasis" on this strategic area of ​​the continent. The Head of State will visit certain countries that are symbols of Françafrique, the Gabon of the Bongos and the Congo of Sassou-Nguesso, a message that is difficult to accept for the African civil societies that he loves. A passage through the Democratic Republic of Congo and Angola is also on the program. The presidency has chosen to highlight consensual themes such as the defense of the environment with the One Forest Summit which is meeting for the first time in Libreville, in accordance with what was announced at COP27. Training in agriculture, the Francophonie, memory and culture will be the other threads of this trip.

Since the Ouagadougou speech in 2017, Emmanuel Macron has been looking for the right tone to stimulate a new partnership with Africa. In front of the students of the capital of Burkina Faso, the young president freshly invested and eager to impose his mark had declared: "there is no more African policy of France". Words "still relevant", he explained Monday, February 27 during a speech at the Élysée, "but more sufficient in the face of the upheavals and profound transformations that we have experienced in recent years".

This speech triggered a few days before the visit surprised in Paris as in Africa. Why not speak directly to Africans on their soil? For more "solemnity", responds Emmanuel Macron. No lyrical and fiery tirades or bombasts, but rather the desire to set a framework, to show a "clearer posture of modesty, listening and ambition". Keeping a low profile, in short, knowing that in this inflammable context, every word can cause a diplomatic incident or further damage France's image on the continent. Praising a "land of optimism and voluntarism", the one who was an intern at the French Embassy in Nigeria during his studies at the ENA pleaded for "a new relationship, balanced, reciprocal and responsible" and to no longer be considered the African continent as a French "backyard" or as a "competition ground" between powers by repeatedly targeting Wagner's Russian militias, this "group of criminal mercenaries". "As always with Emmanuel Macron, the words are well said, the orientation is good. But you have to judge in actions, "comments an actor in the file present during the president's speech.

The Head of State remained very evasive on the angry subject, the security and military question, considering however that France no longer had to behave like the policeman of Africa. “There is disappointment with France. And there is a disappointment because it has perhaps been too much to believe that we were alone in resolving the entire issue of terrorism, "he assessed. Now is the time for "co-construction", the reduction of French personnel to the benefit of national armies and the transformation of bases. The "overexposure strategy" must gradually fade away in favor of a "second curtain strategy", as implemented in particular in Niger, it is argued at the Elysée. Emmanuel Macron neither mentioned the failure of Operation Barkhane nor detailed the means allocated to the deployment of this new military partnership. "He said that the external operations are over. France can no longer be in the front line, it is now “in support”. Because Emmanuel Macron has understood that France playing the policeman while the others do business, it's a bad deal for Paris", deciphers Antoine Glaser, journalist and writer, specialist in Africa, author of the book Le Piège africaine de Macron – From the continent to France, with Pascal Airault.

One question remains: does France still have the means to maintain soft power in Africa? Reaffirming that he felt "no nostalgia" for Françafrique, Emmanuel Macron has yet to show the contours of the new system he intends to promote, on both continents. "We will succeed in this new partnership if we assume France's share of Africanity", he considered, calling for "strengthening the desire for Africa in France". The president recalled that he was symbolically ready for the end of the CFA franc. A good thing, according to the philosopher and writer Achille Mbembe, author of a report in 2021 on the rebuilding of relations between Africa and France. “Emmanuel Macron is in the middle of the ford. He saw the end of a dying system that somehow refuses to die – Françafrique – without having yet reached the other shore. One of the reasons is the weakness of the African forces themselves", explains the one who has just published La Communauté Terrestre, who regrets an "intellectual, moral and political defeat" of France in Africa. “The President is proposing dialogue while Africans are fighting back, because they are afraid of being manipulated! They think that the president is not sincere, but without giving an alternative. Do they prefer military coups? Jihadist violence? Third terms, inheritance from father to son? »

This trip to Central Africa will probably not be enough to reverse the trend. Little recognized for his action in environmental matters on national soil, Emmanuel Macron will seek to strengthen his international leadership on this subject during the One Forest Summit in Libreville, centered on the protection of biodiversity and the fight against deforestation. "Climate change is a common challenge," the president wants to believe. He will be keen, in his speeches, to enhance his "narrative" of international relations, calling for a way out of the divide between a "supposedly Western North" and a "global South". On the economic level, while saying he wants to "get out of the logic of rent" vis-à-vis Africa, the president intends to "defend the interests" of France by taking care of the networks, diversifying economic partnerships and supporting African entrepreneurship with new cooperation. On the cultural level, Emmanuel Macron intends to deepen his work of restitution of the African heritage of works. A framework law on the subject is also in preparation.

“The president questioned a lot of French taboos. The horizon is drawn, it remains to implement all this, to encourage support. It's a work of Hercules," concedes philosopher Achille Mbembe, who has the ear of Emmanuel Macron. For his part, Mamadou Diouf, director of the Institute of African Studies at Columbia University in New York, judges Emmanuel Macron's African policy more severely. "The French authorities must respect the positions of Africans and stop treating them as immature political subjects that they must take care of. They must pay attention to the profound changes on the continent, to a youth that is gradually getting rid of the tinsel of a past of inequality, domination and submission to metropolitan rule. »