Opinions #19/24
Françafrique, Adieu…
The former French colonies are becoming increasingly distant from Paris. The steps are multiplied to gradually reduce the dependence on the previous reference power. Replaced by new players on the precious African chessboard
France in the Sahel and West Africa: major upheavals
Dakar, Bamako, N’Djamena, Ouagadougou, and most recently Niamey, the same scenes from March 2021 onwards are repeated and look the same: the streets are rattled, “France get out,” French brands are looted (Auchan, Eiffage, Orange, Total), the tricolor flag is burned, and in some cases the Russian flag is proudly displayed. Operation Barkhan, which began in 2014 in the Sahel, was forced to withdraw its military forces from Niger in 2022 and then leave the theater of war in December 2023. Stunned by this “liberation” wave, a number of media and analysts in France and the West conclude that with the assertion of anti-French sentiment in Africa, in short, is a story of love spite where political battles are actually taking place, definitely mixed with anger and accumulated resentment. The expression of anti-French sentiment is problematic in many ways. This tends to depoliticize issues, while on the one hand, African researchers refute this expression, which puts them on the side of emotion rather than reason, and on the other hand, it disqualifies the struggle that Africans are waging to access their military, economic, and monetary sovereignty (1).
Political struggle for asserted sovereignty: the CFA franc in question
In a video dated 2019, Italy’s future far-right Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni, in a populist accusation that went viral, blamed the CFA franc, and by extension Paris, a participant in the system, for being responsible for both poverty in francophone sub-Saharan Africa and migration to Europe. In addition to the diplomatic differences that may have caused these remarks, Georgia Meloni has established a causal link (CFA franc/migration) that has never been demonstrated. African migrations are mostly intra-African: internal movements and migration in neighboring countries (2). Regardless, the Italian representative asked, albeit erroneously, the burning question of 2024: the end of the CFA franc.
Let us start by clarifying that France is bound by monetary cooperation agreements with three African monetary zones: West African Economic and Monetary Union (UEMOA), the Central African Economic and Monetary Community (CEMAC), and the Union of the Comoros (3). Reforms have been initiated since 2019, especially in the UEMOA area.
In December of that year, President Alassane Ouattara, along with his French counterpart Emmanuel Macron, announced the end of the CFA franc. Four years later, this currency is still in circulation. The states of the central Sahel and Senegal have at this stage announced their desire to withdraw from the system. However, significant reforms have been introduced since 2020: the abolition of the obligation to transfer half of the UEMOA zone’s foreign exchange reserves to the French Treasury’s operating account and France’s withdrawal from the monetary authority. However, this is still not enough for opponents of this monetary system. On the one hand, the name remains unchanged and has symbolic meaning – the declension of the acronym has just been changed to the franc of the French colonies of Africa, which became the franc of the African Financial Community in 1958 – even if the name Eco, a diminutive of the English acronym ECOWAS (4) in 2019 was considered by the West African side but failed to establish itself. On the other hand, France remains the guarantor of this currency and its fixed parity with the euro. This role of guarantor, according to Senegalese economist Ndongo Samba Sylla, is “an invisible weapon that France can always use to subjugate dissident leaders,” an example, he says, always demonstrated during the adoption of sanctions against military regimes (5). The Togolese economist Kako Nubukpo, known for his positions against the CFA, advocates starting a debate on the African side on an in-depth reform of the system according to a clear roadmap: defining a geographical perimeter (UEMOA/ECOWAS?), a new monetary basket, a calendar, and adopting a new name (6). Paris, for its part, seems ready for a complete disengagement, as suggested by its foreign minister, Stéphane Séjourné, urging Africans to take responsibility. France now faces the challenge of simplifying the problem and showing that it has changed its programmatic logic in Africa. Will African heads of state be able to reach common ground? Nothing is less certain, except that the process of the disappearance of the CFA franc seems to have already begun.
France faces competition for access to strategic minerals in Africa
The ghosts of Françafrique are still hiding: the invisible hand of Paris in decision-making, the opacity of contracts, the extortion of elites. Quite paradoxically and despite persistent rumors, according to which France initiated operations Serval (2013), then Barkhane (2014) in Mali and the central Sahel in order to plunder the natural resources that abound in these countries (gold, uranium), French companies – with the exception of Orano (formerly Areva) – in Niger, are far from being in a monopoly situation in these countries. According to the latest data available to us, France represented 0.52% of Mali’s imports in 2022 and was not among the five countries importing gold and cotton from Burkina Faso in 2019.
According to the latest Ecofin Pro data, France is unlikely to become a major player in Africa’s mining sector. The company is currently involved in four projects, including two uranium projects in Niger, one manganese project in Gabon, and one niobium project in Namibia. In an extensive and multi-site article entitled “New Challenges of Mining Expansion in Africa,” published on January 31, 2024 on The Conversation website, authors Julien Gourdon, Emilie Normand, Hugo Lapeyronie, and Philippe Bosse highlight that 80% of mining investments in Africa are made by Western and predominantly Anglo-Saxon companies (7). Canada looks particularly active: 98 companies with a turnover of $37,040 million invested in the continent in 2022 (8).
With the emergence of accounting firms, such as McKinsey, and the liberalization of the mining sector in the early 2000s, new players emerged. In 2018, the Chinese had already invested in nearly thirty mining projects, a figure that has changed significantly since then as Chinese companies have expanded into exploration projects (9).
Finally, Russia, while not a major player, is investing in diamonds and platinum in Southern Africa and gold in West Africa. The Wagner Group, renamed into the African Corps, provides military support to mining concessions in Sudan and the Central African Republic. In Mali, the system is more insidious. In the name of state sovereignty, a reform of the Mining Code was enacted, increasing its share from 20% to 30% of the capital of gold mining companies, most of which were Anglo-Saxon. New tax revenues, according to The Blood Gold Report, help finance the intervention of the Russian Expeditionary Corps (10). Changes that could prompt Western companies to leave.
Recomposition of the Power Game in the Sahel and West Africa
Given Russian expansion, some analysts conclude that the Cold War is returning to the continent. Although this hypothesis cannot be ruled out, we are currently witnessing a very unstable situation. The Russians are pursuing an offensive strategy to destabilize France and the West, although the latter has not yet decided on a counter-strategy, individual or general, in the sequence of asserting neo-sovereign regimes.
Central Sahel states fully embrace a counterterrorism partnership with Moscow when Chad, Mauritania, or other countries outside the West African perimeter, such as South Africa, claim to be working with all players. Following the campaign on the topic of breaking with France, there are fears that Senegal will fall into the Russian camp. There is currently nothing to confirm this shift. President Faye called for “virtuous, respectful, and mutually productive cooperation” when his more dangerous Prime Minister Ousmane Sonko – “it’s time for France to leave us alone” (11) – approved the opening of an Auchan store in his town of Ziguinchor in November 2023. French diplomacy is now playing on velvet. Its European and American allies are wary of this unwieldy partner. The United States distanced itself from its policy in Niger only to be thanked by the military junta (denouncing their military agreement, after which they agreed to the withdrawal of their base at Agadez in the north of the country). Will they continue their involvement in the Gulf of Guinea countries? It will all depend on the new American president to be elected next November. In this geopolitical upheaval, which is still difficult to understand, the only element we take for granted is that Africans are now willing to choose their partner, which is a sign of the reaffirmation of their sovereignty.
(1) See Roussy Caroline, “Africa, anti-French sentiment,” RIS, 133, Spring 2024, pp. 47-172
(2) https://africacenter.org/fr/spotlight/migratory-tendities-to-surveiller-en-afrique-en-2024/
(3) UEMOA combines Benin, Burkina Faso, Côte d’Ivoire, Guinea-Bissau, Mali, Niger, Senegal, and Togo, and CEMAC combines Cameroon, Central African Republic, Congo, Chad, Equatorial Guinea, and Gabon.
(4) ECOWAS: Economic Community of West African States.
(5) SYLLA Ndongo Samba, “The CFA franc is an invisible weapon that France can always use to subdue dissident leaders,” in RIS 133, Op. cit.
(6) NUBUKPO Kako, “Debate on the advantages and disadvantages of the CFA franc remains forbidden,” Le Point, April 16, 2024, https://www.lepoint.fr/afrique/kako-nubukpo-le-debat-sur-les-avantages-et-inconvenients-du-franc-cfa-reste-interdit-16-04-2024-2557837_3826.php
(7) https://theconversation.com/les-nouveaux-entreprises-de-lexpansion-miniere-en-afrique-220605
(9) Op. cit.
(10) https://bloodgoldreport.com/, LE CAM Morgane, “In Mali, mining companies face financial pressure from Bamako to pay Wagner’s mercenaries,” Le Monde Afrique, December 21, 2023,
IRIS Research Director, Specialist in Modern African History
