The least that can be said is that the Trump presidency has viewed Africa as a minor subject. It just showed a clear disinterest in Africa, contenting itself with extending the status quo where the United States was already engaged. But we should not expect miracles from his successor, warn many voices on the continent.
The Nelson Mandela Foundation said its “relief” at the announcement of the victory of Joe Biden, who is to succeed Donald Trump in January. “We will no longer watch him undermine democratic institutions or listen to him bring dishonor” to his function “four more years”.
It remains for the future president the “titanic task” of starting “the deepening of racism, sexism, xenophobia, Afrophobia” put in place by Trump, adds the Foundation.
“Country of shit. All of Africa remembers this phrase attributed to Trump to describe the African countries from which people seeking to emigrate to the United States came. “Contempt”, “condescension”, the expression shocked, lastingly.
His “attitude bordering on respect” displeased, “just like his very restrictive immigration policy”, underlines Ousmane Sène, director of the West African Research Center (WARC) based in Dakar.
In return, “during these four years, it has been disenchantment or indifference. : proof, the lack of interest that the African media gave to America during this period ”.
Security in the Sahel
The United States has focused on the essentials for them: counterterrorism, existing aid programs. But little diplomacy or politics. And even of economic strategy. During these “four lost years”, they ceded a lot of ground to China, in particular in terms of trade.
Washington has thus finalized defense agreements with Senegal, Ghana and Niger and granted “decisive support” to the Sahel alongside France, underlines Pape Malick Ba, professor of American studies at the Cheikh Anta Diop University of Dakar.
Trump’s record in Africa is “below his predecessors Obama and Bush”, judges the latter, saying that he lacked “specific strategy”. Moreover “he did not set foot on the continent and had even fired” his Secretary of State Rex Tillerson “in full African tour” in 2018, he recalls.
In Nigeria, Africa’s most populous country, US policy under Trump has been “inert, ineffective and devoid of a moral compass,” write US researchers Judd Devermont and Matthew Page.
The lack of American reaction to the repression of protests in October in Lagos is a glaring example. Joe Biden, then a candidate for the White House, is ahead of the State Department by issuing a press release denouncing the live ammunition against the crowd. Proof that Washington is “outdated and not reactive,” said Mr. Page to AFP.
Third term Obama
Biden should weigh more heavily on human rights violations, said SBM Intelligence, a Nigerian geopolitical consultant.
But “hoping for better relations between Africa and the United States will lead to disillusion,” warns a former Nigerian ambassador to Washington, George Obiozor, recalling the disappointment already generated by the mandates of Barack Obama.
The Biden presidency, “one can imagine that it will be a sort of third Obama term, where we will find a more committed America” in the world, however, advances René Lake, political analyst, in the Senegalese daily. The Observer.
Washington should reconnect with multilateralism, consolidate its diplomatic relations, return to the World Health Organization (WHO) and the Paris climate agreement.
But in the meantime, the posturing of Trump, shouting fraud and contesting the results in recent days, do not serve as an example to young African democracies, rather evoking the United States become a “banana republic”, ironically and worry several commentators.
His attitude “risks teaching Africa and reinforcing all heads of state who do not want to come to terms with the democratic game”, worries Jean Bosco Manga, president of a Chadian human rights association.
“As Nelson Mandela said, a good leader knows when it is time to leave”, notes the foundation of the same name in Johannesburg: “It is not yet too late for Trump to choose dignity, for him and for them. other. “
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