“The age of Françafrique is over” and France is now a “neutral interlocutor” on the continent, Emmanuel Macron said Thursday in Gabon, where he participated in a summit on the protection of tropical forests, at the beginning of a four-day tour of Central Africa.
During this first stage, the French president wanted to illustrate, in the green setting of the French embassy in Gabon, his new African strategy for the next four years, which was rolled out from Paris earlier this week.
At a time when France is increasingly contested in certain African countries such as Mali or Burkina, he advocated “humility” in his speech on Monday and encouraged a new “balanced” and “responsible” partnership with this continent, as well as a reduction in the French military presence, which has been concentrated for ten years on the fight against jihadism in the Sahel.
“This age of Françafrique is over and I sometimes have the feeling that mentalities are not evolving at the same pace as us when I read, I hear, I see that France is still attributed intentions that she doesn’t have, that she doesn’t have anymore,” Macron said Thursday morning to the French community in Gabon.
In recent years, France has tried to break with “Françafrique”, its opaque practices and its networks of influence inherited from colonialism. But on the continent, Emmanuel Macron is still criticized for continuing his meetings with African leaders deemed authoritarian.
A summit, co-organized with Gabon and his counterpart Ali Bongo Ondimba and baptized One Forest Summit, devoted to the protection of tropical forests in Libreville, gave him the opportunity to illustrate the new partnerships he has called for from his wishes.
“We are going to make an additional 100 million euros available to countries wishing to accelerate their strategy to protect vital carbon and biodiversity reserves”, and France will contribute half of this investment, he announced. “More political commitment from countries and in exchange, more funding”, summed up Emmanuel Macron, adding that he wanted to “replace natural capital at the heart of our economies”.
Exchanges in the afternoon with NGOs, scientists, and a dozen heads of state in the sub-region, were marked by the vibrant plea for the rights of communities by Hindu Oumarou Ibrahim, an activist Chadian ecologist and geographer greeted with an ovation.
“We do a lot of summits often far from the countries most concerned where we all say that we are going to put billions of euros (…) and when we go to the countries concerned we are asked where the millions of euros are which have still not arrived,” Macron said in his opening remarks.
“There is no need for a commitment from Libreville, there is a need for an action plan from Libreville”, insisted Mr. Macron in his closing speech.
The compensation mechanism announced “for ecosystem services rendered” responds to a “faulty model”, according to the Head of State, who adds that the carbon market “has drifted in recent years on a voluntary market” which has “depreciated the price carbon” with “greenwashing phenomena”. “The big risk, if we stop there, is that a distrust is setting in with regard to carbon credits”.
Other Heads of State including Denis Sassou-Nguesso (Congo-Brazzaville), Faustin Archange Touadéra (Central African Republic), Mahamat Idriss Déby Itno (Chad) or Teodoro Obiang Nguema Mbasogo (Equatorial Guinea) were also present.
The arrival of Emmanuel Macron has been decried by part of the Gabonese political opposition and civil society, who accuse him of coming to “honor” Ali Bongo, re-elected under controversial conditions in 2016 and who will probably be a candidate for his re-election this year. “I did not come to invest anyone”, defended the head of state this morning before the French community in Gabon.
Mr. Bongo had succeeded his father, Omar Bongo Ondimba, after the death of this pillar of Françafrique who had ruled the country for 41 years.
This is Emmanuel Macron’s 18th trip to Africa since the start of his first five-year term in 2017, where French influence and presence are increasingly questioned.
Since 2022, the French army has been pushed out of Mali and Burkina Faso by the ruling juntas in these two countries. On Tuesday, the day after Mr Macron’s speech on Africa, Burkina also denounced a military assistance agreement signed with France in 1961, the year after the country’s independence from a former French colony.
After Gabon, the French president will travel to Angola where he will sign an agreement aimed at developing the agricultural sector there. He will then make a brief stopover in Brazzaville, where Denis Sassou Nguesso has ruled the Congo with an iron fist for nearly 40 years. A meeting which again risks appearing against the grain of his speech on Monday.
He will conclude this tour with a trip to the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC), a former Belgian colony but also the largest French-speaking country in the world, led by President Félix Tshisekedi, in power since January 2019, and who has already expressed his intention to run for president in December.
02/03/2023 21:06:25 – Libreville (AFP) – © 2023 AFP
