EU-AU summit: “There is skepticism on the side of African countries”

Brussels is hosting the sixth European Union-African Union summit on 17 and 18 February 2022.

© RFI/Paulina Zidi

Text by: Paulina Zidi Follow

6 mins

On February 17 and 18, 2022, Africa and Europe meet for a summit in Brussels, Belgium.

This is the sixth meeting of its kind between the two continents almost five years after the last edition in Abidjan.

On the menu for discussion: the new Europe-Africa partnership as deciphered by Geert Laporte, director of the European Think Tanks Group, a network of European

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Interview.

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RFI: In what state of mind do European and African political leaders approach this meeting

Geert Laporte

This summit is coming very late.

The last one took place in Abidjan in 2017 and, normally, these meetings take place every three years.

But a few days after the launch by the European Union of its strategy with Africa, in March 2020, the Covid arrived and part of the world was confined.

The enthusiasm that accompanied this presentation is no longer there.

France is making a lot of effort, Emmanuel Macron is making a lot of effort to make people believe that this will be

.

But on the African side, I have the impression that the reactions are quite weak.

How do you explain this lack of enthusiasm on the part of African leaders

On the African side, there is this attitude which means that after several summits with big declarations, big words, with presidents who spoke about a whole new partnership, I have the impression that there is a some skepticism.

African leaders reacted in a rather wait-and-see manner.

Europe wants to make Africa its preferred partner, but is Europe ready to make concessions?

African countries are afraid that this summit will not take into account African agendas with regard to migration, green transformation, with regard to peace and security.

The challenge of this summit is ultimately to know if the two sides will negotiate with each other as equals or if it will always be a relationship of dependence.

It remains an asymmetrical partnership, Africa has the impression that Europe talks a lot about partnership, but that it does not keep its promises and that it is not ready to make concessions.

And for its part, what does the European Union expect from its African partners

The European Union is very nervous.

She is aware of the fact that Africa has the choice between different partners: China, Turkey, Russia… Especially in the countries of the field of France, like Mali, CAR and others.

The impression exists that the African side wants to change this power relationship by demonstrating that it has a choice.

And that makes the European side quite nervous, hence the European promises to invest more in Africa, to mobilize financing, investments, international aid up to amounts that we never had seen, quite impressive.

.

And the African side is not convinced of this reality, it takes a certain distance vis-à-vis this European enthusiasm.

This summit, which was initially to take place in the fall of 2020, is finally taking place under the French presidency of the European Union.

Can this have an influence on the discussions

It is a country that has a real interest in this relationship with Africa, given its history.

On the African side, we have the Senegalese presidency of the AU, so the Senegal-France tandem is a very strong tandem.

But on the other hand, we must not forget that France is sometimes very controversial in Africa.

There are quite a few African states that no longer have the same trust.

Part of the public, especially young people, think that France has not always been consistent.

She supported some leaders in some dysfunctional states, especially because she was afraid of losing ground vis-à-vis China and other countries.

As you said, France is singled out for its attitude with certain controversial heads of state, but Europe also finally will welcome leaders who are sometimes criticized for the management of human rights in their country...

What we notice in the agenda of this summit is that the question of governance has almost entirely been evacuated from the debates.

Because the European side knows perfectly well that it cannot deal with this theme in a coherent way.

Europe wants to avoid a debate of the deaf on this subject.

The EU is looking for allies and those allies may have quite a controversial human rights record.

This is the case of Rwanda, which has become the European darling, while the country is the subject of much criticism in terms of human rights.

Before, we could spend a summit discussing Mugabe [the former president of Zimbabwe, editor's note].

Today, that would no longer be possible.

Europe wants to prevent this from polluting the agenda, to prevent this from having quite serious consequences.

Conversely

, a subject that risks being on the menu of these discussions is the theme of immigration...

This is an exemplary case where the two continents should be able to cross the barrier between their two positions.

Europe wants to avoid illegal migration while Africa wants to have opportunities to travel, work and even study in Europe.

It will be a big debate: to what extent is Europe ready to make concessions?

Will we only talk about returns and border control, trafficking, or will we have a desire to also talk about mobility?

In 2017, in Abidjan, the idea of ​​“

It is a failure that shows European paternalism.

There were many European leaders who dreamed of these "hot spots" to stop African migrants.

They thought that by giving a little money to African states, they would stop the flow.

Now, we know that it does not work, the States are not ready to do it or else against billions of euros and this money, today, is not available.

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