AFRICANEWS

AFRICA

Is France walking away from Africa?

by James Brew (1,320 words)

France's once strong influence in Africa has waned dramatically since the collapse of the Mobutu regime. And now the government in Paris is reconsidering its position within Africa, more so with its ex-colonies south of the Sahara.

The demise of the Mobutu regime in former Zaire and the change of government in Paris have ocassioned a complete re-thinking of France's complex, shady and often passionate relations with its ex-colonies south of the Sahara. The socialist government envisages a commitment to democracy, reform of France's military role, and the eventual creation of an autonomous foreign aid agency. The ability of Prime Minister Lionel Jospin's government to transform its radical thoughts into action will depend crucially on the goodwill of President JacqeusChirac, who has wavered between reform and reaction.

Foreign policy is a presidential prerogative but aid is a government-controlled issue which gives Jospin some leverage. Jospin whose Protestant background smacks to the French of puritanical rigour may keep his word. Even before he came to power, there were signs that France's policy on Africa was changing. The demise of Mobutu - preceded by the death earlier this year of Jacques Foccart, adviser on Africa to successive French presidents - seemed to mark the end of the era of France's cloak-and-dagger diplomacy in Africa.

The new government has already sent shockwaves through French-speaking Africa with its plans to withdraw about 3,000 of the 8,400 French troops permanently stationed in six African countries by the year 2002. Special defence and assistance agreements that have held for more than 30 years are to be redrawn. France has military co-operation agreements with 23 African countries and defence pacts with eight. Defence chiefs have advised that the biggest military base in Djibouti, east Africa should be maintained along with smaller, strategic installations in Cote D'voire, Gabon and Senegal. An international defence analyst, Malik Patel says the eight bilateral defence accords and 23 military co-operation agreements between Paris and individual African countries would be replaced with regional agreements with groups of African countries. France is also in support of a Pan-African peace force.

France has propped up friendly African presidents - often installed by French soldiers in the first place - with aid, technical advice, military training and in some instances military intervention. Last year President Chirac declared the days of unilateral intervention were over: France would no longer play "the gendarme of Africa". Yet Chirac so far has given no hint that France is walking away from Africa.

France's new man for Africa, Charles Josselin, describes the new Franco-African relationship as "a partnership between responsible adults in an open economy". However, he has not ditched conditionality - the watchword for granting aid. While France would maintain expectations in the "march towards democracy", he added "we will be more demanding with the countries doing better economically." His ministry (of co-operation) has traditionally been the center of a web of personal contacts backed by US$ 9 million of development aid through which France controlled its African possessions. The new government has downgraded it to a department of the foreign ministry.

France's once strong influence in Africa has waned dramatically since the collapse of the Mobutu regime. The fall of Mobutu's Zaire to current President Laurent Kabila completes a network of friends and allies stretching from Angola to Eriteria who are expected to reshape the continent in an image of their own and scrub out the colonial map of Africa drawn up at the Berlin conference of European powers in 1884. Led by Ugandan President Yoweri Museveni, a clique of African leaders - all men with respectable military prowess who in most cases fought their way into office. These have embarked on an ambitious offensive to end the civil strife in central Africa.

Museveni leads but does not dominate the powerful coalition of African leaders behind Laurent Kabila, a group of exceptionally strong-willed individuals instinctively disinclined to do anyone else's bidding. The coalition beside Museveni and Kabila, includes Rwanda's Paul Kagame, Eriteria's Issayas Aferworki, Ethiopia Meles Zenawi, Angola's defence force commander, General Joao de Matos effectively representing Luanda and Sudan People's Liberation Army John Garang de Mahoir. Many first met in the 1970s in Tanzania under the auspices of former Tanzania President Juluis Nyerere and his political circle. Some like Museveni studied at Dar es Salaam University.

But Uganda's grinding poverty limits Museveni capacity to finance such ventures: its Gross Domestic Product is forecast too slow two percentage points - for the first time in a decade - to 6.5 percent due to trade bottlenecks and instability.

France's African policy-makers whine that their country's waning influence on the continent is a heinous conspiracy. Three versions circulate: the Gringo plot, involving covert military support from Washington for Museveni and Kabila to undermine French cultural and economic interests in Central Africa; les Anglo-Saxon plot, which ties into a grand American design and a Tutsi/Hima plot in which Kagame and Museveni ally with their Hamitic brothers in Ethiopia and Eriteria to undermine the state system in East and Central Africa.

France remains by far the largest contributor of development assistance to Africa and in the long-term would like to cultivate closer links between southern Africa and the CFA zone of north, west and central Africa where its influence has traditionally been strongest. French aid - currently standing at 0.55 percent of its GNP - is still far more than Britain's or Germany's. The United Nations target is 0.7 percent of Gross National Product.

To be sure, France has been more willing to listen to Africa's cry for help than most Western nation. In 1995 it ratified the cancellation of development loans to CFA countries worth US$ 4.2 billion (Ff 25 billion).

The CFA zone's importance to France is not economic. The combined GNP of the 14 African members (including the Comoros) in 1993 was four percent of France's. The French Treasury, whose domestic difficulties include a struggle to cut the budget deficit at a time of massive unemployment, will not be producing more cash for Africa. France is now counseling its African wards to accept currency devaluation in exchange for credits from the International Monetary Fund and the World Bank and substantial debt reduction.

There are suggestions that the Franc Zone should be done away with in favour of a wholly African currency. France's formal position is that CFA zone governments should pursue with vigour regional economic and trade integration. The Zone countries tend to produce comparable consumer and light industrial goods and grow same crops. With such small domestic markets the potential for greater integration is limited.

France has secured extra financial assistance for its former colonies from the World Bank, the IMF and the European Union. The poorer west African countries appear to have recovered well since the devaluation, but the economic management of the Central African states, including oil-rich Gabon and Congo-Brazzville does not yet meet IMF criteria. Yet it is the vast oil reserves of Gabon and Congo that long-term French interests lie. Chirac is determined to protect them. He agrees that francophone Africa must free its trade and open its economies to non-French investment but he is twitchy about an American takeover.

While nominally a member of the 'Anglo-Saxon' club South Africa, sees only advantage in France's increased interest. French electricity, water, telecommunications and engineering firms have started to fill the gap left by the withdrawal of the three giant French car firms in the 1980s. They have already pushed France into sixth position on South Africa's list of trading partners. Trade between the two countries is relatively low in the region of 6.7 billion rands a year.

At present France imports one percent of South Africa exports and South African officials say they hope to boost trade by 50 percent over the next three years. Analysts say that the prospects for French investment in South Africa and the greater South African Development Community (SADC) are good and there is a growing in joint ventures between firms form the two countries.

French development aid to South Africa has grown more than five times in the past three years to over US$ 100 million.

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