France options for time to stay in political Africa

The speech of French president Emmanuel Macron at the annual conference of French ambassadors on January 8, in which the decline of France in Africa discussed after most French African countries to close the French military bases on his soil, is The highest and most important French declaration in this presence in this presence in this respect. Although President Macron addressed the leaders of French diplomacy, his speech was not at all diplomacy.

The French president denied that his country decreases in Africa and said: “We reorganize ourselves”, and added that the closure of the French military bases was a decision agreed with the African presidents and left them the task of announcing it.

Macron said he was sad; Because African leaders did not thanked his country for the major services provided by the French military bases and added, and in a tone of superiority, that the African presidents did not want to fight negative movements in their country, as much as They were eager to stay on the authority of power, and it had not been for the French army, it would not have been that some of them were seated on their chairs today.

The French president said that his country did not retire to Africa and that the closure of his military bases was a prior agreed arrangement and that African leaders have carried out what had been asked for them, but they insulted the staging.

However, this logic does not seem at all convincing, because the response of African leaders was very strong to the declarations of the French president, and some, as in Senegal, Chad and Mali, responded to Saa’a Saae in France, recalling Those who had not been for the value of African soldiers of the Second World War, it may be.

Although the speech was directed towards diplomats and diplomacy was the argument with kindness, the speech was a faces carrier, and it was not without threat of the use of force. Otherwise, what does President Macron mean that if it was not for the French army, many African leaders would not have been seated on their chairs?

This non -diplomatic language can be understood that the French army, which has kept certain African leaders on their chairs as a path, is also able to exclude them.

This usual Maconian superiority contradicts the new policy towards Africa, which Macron preached in his famous speech at the University of Ouagadogo, the capital of Burkina Faso, known as “Ouagadogo Sermon”, in which was absolved by the consequences of French colonialism in Africa. He also contradicted his plan, which he approved in 2022, which aimed to establish a partnership and French African military cooperation with new standards.

What are the French military agreements?

This is what we mean by a group of secret military and security actions signed in the 1960s, after the independence of the French colonies in West Africa, that is to say in the phase of the brutal iron fist of France in its previous colonies. Despite the confidentiality of these agreements, some veterans of soldiers and politicians raised part of their content. We will briefly present what has been nominated for its content:

• African countries give France the right to establish military bases on their territory, without obtaining the authorization or approval of the parliaments of these countries, and these rules are French land according to which the host state has not the right to know what is going on in them. France is also not obliged to provide information on these rules, the nature of its work or the number of soldiers, or the type of weapons and events it undertakes. Thus, the French bases in Africa have become reservations and advanced centers for spying and collecting information, and the implementation of policies and operations which exclusively serve France.
• France has the freedom to use African airspace by the French Air Force whenever necessary, without informing the host countries of the nature of air investigations carried out by French military aviation.
• African soldiers are trained in France, with African countries to pay training costs to their envoys, whatever their value, compared to training in other military and academies.
• African countries are determined to inform France of any military cooperation they make, or any military agreement they wish to sign with other countries and obtain Paris approval.
• In the event that France is exposed to an external military threat, soldiers from African countries join the French army to defend France and, in return, Paris undertakes to protect the previous colonies and its nationals in the event of a threat.

These secret military agreements, in addition to economic agreements, have formed the backbone of France’s African policy, known as “France Africa”.

These unjust agreements have been designed by French Diguli since the start of the fifth Republic, the main goal of which was to ensure that France remains in Africa for the longest possible period.

These agreements were supervised by a famous French politician Diguli, Jack Foukar, African advisor to General Charles de Gaulle, who led French policy in Africa directly or indirectly from 1958 to his death in March 1997.

Although these agreements are unfair and loving, their application was more unfair. It was designed to preserve the interests of France only, without indifference to the interests of peoples, insofar as Paris considered that the African president who, according to his vision, is part of his interests which were to be preserved.

Consequently, her brutal hand fired who governs an African country, and she did not hesitate to intervene directly and to travel to impose certain presidents, without examining the opinion of the people. History is full of French military interventions in West Africa.

A new vision of military cooperation

Many factors have helped to increase the degree of collective African conscience of the truth of unjust French policies imposed by Paris on its previous colonies, which led to the emergence of a new generation of African politicians and heads of opinion , which has strengthened the state of a large popular dissatisfaction against the African policy of France, in particular against these military agreements the secret economy between Paris and its former colonies.

He is congratulated by President Macron, his audacity to criticize the unfair colonial policies of Africa, in public, as happened in the famous Wagadogo Sermon at the start of his first presidential mandate in 2017, in which he Officially announced the end of “France” Africa “” disowned the French colonial period of Africa, as it is generation born after the end of the colonial era.

He also announced his desire to build a new balanced and responsible military partnership with Africa and stressed that he would rethink the French military bases on the continent.

Consequently, in 2022, France announced characteristics of a new vision of military cooperation with dazzling African countries. He suggested reducing the number of French soldiers in Africa and that the rules are managed with a joint administration between France and the host countries. I also suggested that certain rules be converted into military academies to train African forces, increase their technical and combat capacities and increase military aid in Africa.

The most important thing that Macron said in this plan is that there is no competition with others in Africa and that the continent is not the reserve of France. There is no doubt that he refers to the new international powers that have started to develop the continent, as; Russia, China and Turkey.

In practice, this plan has not found its way for implementation, because the situation in the countries of the African coast in particular, and in West Africa in general, worked with what Paris did not want not. The large popular momentum against France’s policies has led to the rise of revolutionary leaders in power, as in Mali, Niger, Burkina Faso, Guinea and Senegal.

These regimes and others have led the flow of confrontation of French expansion on the continent and to liquidate the military bases, without coordination with Paris. Thus, France was forced to leave its “rear garden”, with all the political, economic and geopolitical challenges and problems that this causes.

Paris Difficult Options

The influence of France is in a real drop in West Africa, which is its main vital area on the continent, despite the official refusal of Elysee. The biggest problem is that the means to return to the momentum of the old relationships are difficult, and the options of Paris are limited and risky.

There are a certain number of difficult options against Paris, including the use of force to return to Africa, stop arming African armies or coordinating with the United States and returning under its coat. Below, we briefly discuss these options:

• Some military veterans call Use of forceAnd Paris did it too. This option is difficult because of the general public rejection of France in the African street and the strength of the influence of civil society organizations, insofar as no sovereign will be able to faithful to France, because that means its end. Indeed, African governments court their people with the challenge of France.
• As for an option Stop sales of arms and military equipmentIt is an ineffective option, because the armies of French African countries do not use French weapons, but rather depend on weapons of Russia, China, Turkey or the United States, because the weapons of French are expensive compared to other productive countries. This confirms that the report on French arms sales abroad, published by the French Ministry of Defense for last year, explained that only two African countries bought weapons in France, Morocco and Senegal . Sales of the two countries were limited to boats and equipment for the naval weapon only.
• It seems to be an option Coordination with the United States of America Difficult, because the American presence on the continent is limited, and it suffers from problems, as has happened in Niger, Chad and Central Africa. This option will be the most difficult in the era of the new administration of President Trump.

Due to the difficulty of all these options, in addition to the turbulent internal political situation, the manufacturer of French political decision has no other choice than to be more pragmatic and rational, and that Paris accepts the fait accompli and Respects the options of African peoples and governments, and use the diplomacy of dialogue with goodness, and not enter into an African confrontation or adventure is mysterious and does not guarantee the consequences.

Any adventure of this type can have to abolish economic agreements, in particular the agreement to use the African franc. And if that happens, France could refuse to become one of the countries of the Third World, as the former president Jacques Chirac said.