By David White, Africa Editor
Published: December 2 2005 02:00 | Last updated: December 2 2005 02:00
France has been coming face-to-face with the delayed after-effects of
African empire.
The recent explosion of anger among youths from north and west African
families in France's suburbs was one example of the past catching up.
Another, earlier this year, was the grim toll of a series of fires in Paris
buildings overcrowded with African migrants.
At the same time there has been intensified questioning - and a tentative
repositioning - of France's policy towards Africa.
Fifty years ago French colonial rule held sway over more than a third of the
continent. In its aftermath, Africa has been the focus of French attention
in the developing world and its overseas military presence. The special
character of these will be highlighted this weekend at an Africa-France
heads of state meeting in Bamako, capital of Mali.
But in a changing Africa, France is caught in a middle ground between the
vestiges of neo-colonial paternalism and new ideas for recasting its
military role and "Europeanising" aspects of its relations with the
continent.
France's Africa policy has had a bumpy ride, from disengagement in the late
1990s following fierce controversy over its role in Rwanda, where it was
exposed to charges of assisting the perpetrators of genocide, to partial
re-engagement since President Jacques Chirac won his second term in 2002. In
Ivory Coast, after a limited initial response to safeguard its citizens,
France's belated intervention left it holding the line in a divided country
and exposed it to unprecedented hostility - especially after its retaliatory
destruction of the government air force in November last year.
Experts in Paris talk of "a certain French hesitancy" at a time when the UK
has been taking the lead in pushing the African agenda among the G8
countries.
France is Africa's biggest donor after the US, dedicating 70 per cent of its
aid to the continent, compared with Britain's 40 per cent. Its treasury
guarantees currency stability for 15 African countries. It has more troops
in Africa than any other outside nation - 14,700, from Senegal in the west
to the French island of La Réunion in the east, with "pre-positioned" forces
at five mainland bases and a permanent naval presence in the Gulf of Guinea.
But the days of unilateral French intervention are gone. "We aren't trying
any longer to be the gendarme of Africa," says a defence official. "There
are things one can't do, quite simply." While leaving semi-secret defence
accords in place, France cannot in future be counted on to intervene
exÂÂcept in the event of foreign attack, officials make clear.
France no longer plunges in under its own authority as it did up to the
1980s. Its 4,000-strong peacekeeping mission in Ivory Coast operates
alongside United Nations forces and under UN mandate. In Democratic Republic
of Congo it took responsibility in 2003 for the European Union's first
military mission outside Europe, again with UN authority. Officials say
France has no plans "for the moment" to cut forces but wants to reconfigure
them to fit the African Union's blueprint for regional peacekeeping
brigades. Since 1997 France has switched its emphasis to training and
equipping African armies. It is seeking wider EU participation in its Recamp
(Reinforcement of African Peacekeeping Capabilities) programme, and expects
agreement at the EU's mid-December summit.
"The idea is to phase in with the AU and propose to Europe to associate
itself, so that it isn't perceived as a French military presence in Africa,"
says a senior Africa expert.
France and Britain have since 1998 been trying to overcome their rivalry,
intermittently staging joint ministerial visits. Paris now talks of a
"Paris-Brussels-London axis". An official explains: "We see the physical and
material limits of any national policy in Africa."
Clearly, France still has business, political and linguistic interests at
stake. But Africa has evolved since the early years of independence, when
French-trained leaders in key former colonies took over where France had
left off. A generation of amenable strongmen is dying off. As a result of
conflict or mismanagement, there is no jewel left in the French colonial
crown.
Philippe Hugon of the Institute for International and Strategic Relations in
Paris, points out that while the French maintain powerful stakes in
traditional commodity and trading sectors in French-speaking nations, the
bigger strategic focus in oil and mining has shifted to countries such as
Nigeria, Angola and South Africa.
The Elf oil company, once a powerful part of the French state machine, has
disappeared, mired in scandal and absorbed by the Total group, while Gabon,
its traditional bastion, is running out of oil. In Ivory Coast, long the
most successful ex-colony, the French comÂÂmunity has shrunk in the
past three years from 23,000 to 8,000, mostly dual nationals, and many
French small businesses have gone.
The "Africa cell" at the presidential Elysée palace, once the hub of
military, secret service and masonic connections, has been pared down to two
diplomats and a Bank of France inspector. Officials say France is trying to
forge a broader policy towards the continent, based less on special
relationships and more reliant on the EU.
A French official reckons Tony Blair, the UK prime minister, is one of the
few leaders to understand that the rich world has limited time for building
a relationship with Africa to confront the scale of problems that will
develop in the next 15-20 years. If it fails, he says, "we will be the ones
to regret it".
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