Gravitated more towards countries like russia and china rather than western ones like france or even the us. First let me introduce our guests. Tunda usazuwa, african team member at black alliance for peace joins us from atlanta. Also joining us is fidel amake whos an International Relations and security analyst who joined us from akra. Welcome to you both. Uh, ill first start with you uh. Tunda usa, im hoping im pronouncing that correctly, looking at the announcement that france has uh made, which has been in the works for for a little bit of time here, even though they resisted it, but uh, they announced that theyre going to begin withdrawing this troops from niger, the key word there of course being uh begin, we dont know whether its going to be extended, but its a start, but overall if it happens, does that mean that frances engagement with niger is over . Yes, well we. That france has around 1,500 troops in niger uh as well as uh multiple military bases uh bases that are used right by france uh to control land, resources and labor within niger right, and and you know part of that is you know the the uh, i think more most popular example right, the uranium from niger, which powers electricity in france, yet less than 18 of nigerian people have less have. Access to electricity right, so i think you know the the removal of um french troops from the country uh speaks to one aspect of this effort to remove french influence, french control, which is um part of a broader system of neuocolonialism right, which is kind of like the survival of uh the colonial system, despite you know the political independence um of a country like niger and other formally colonized countries, um, but its not just these right, theres uh the continued economic domination, theres the persistence of the frienceifa right, which is the uh currency controlled by france, that niger and other countries uh in in west africa in the of sahel use, so i think this is part of a longer and a broader struggle, um, and its not just france that is is part of this effort to to to you know, you know, regain sovereignty and control of their land and of resources, there other countries like the us and other native. Countries that need to be removed, so this is part of a Browder Browder effort. All right, fidel, i guess are talked and touched a number of issues which were going to get into, hopefully all of them if we can, but lets talk about the security situation that warranted french troops to be there in the first place, okay . Um, and id like to actually uh refer to a quote from a citizen of niger who said, they cant tell us that the french army was successful, i dont understand how they can say that they are here to help people fight terrorism. And every year the situation got worse, so the the french didnt help, they didnt help with the security situation, they were not able to defeat the terrorists, now either they didnt want to do that because they had ulterior motives such as staying longer in niger, or theres another story behind it, im not too sure, maybe theyre just going to handle it, but what do you make of the explanation that not only in niger, but also other countries, like mali and burquinha faso, french were asked to leave because they couldnt. In part handle fighting the uh terrorists that that were stationed the sahel region. All right, thank you very much for this opportunity. Firstly, the first time france had a more uh aggravated or more pronounced security or military presence in the sahil was in 20112012, that was when a mini Islamic State was created in northern mali, so what we call the operation saval. Was initiated by france, later on, the sahel states formed the gen 5 sahel, a military alliance that was supposed to defeat um the terrorists and so. It meant that these countries themselves with their National Armies came together to defeat the terrorists, but then frank, france was leading what we call the operation bakin, that is the second operation after operation seval, so with that operation, all these countries joined hands with france in fighting against terrorism, now were with france and its former colonies, as i have always said, the arrangements after the post colon. Arrangement was not too favorable for the colonies in west africa and beyond, and so france has a lot of influence, but in respect of the security, after operation bakin was formed, the control or the fight against terrorism did not really fair too well for the people, and terrorists like the jnim and isis affiliates were still more potent and were attacking International Forces and malians, burkinabes, jerans and chadians and and so on and so forth, so um, basically the French Military endeavor in the region was not as successful as it was expected to be, even though it had initially gained some successes, however, after um there was a military cool in mali, mali decided to expell French Forces in exchange and then went in for wagnar, now in burkina faso, burkina faso follows. And in niger, you see the people, they see france as a new colonial power, and so the regimes or the military is able to whip up such sentiments to their own advantage in a way, and so if the people do not want france, then so be it, the country belongs to them, and if they dont want it, that is it, however, after the military took over in mali and burkina faso, the security situation has not got any better, it has even gotten worse, so i think that even in as much as franc is being ejected, the militaries should Pay Attention to their domestic security, because things are getting really really bad. Let me ask you something uh, do you in your estimate, how many terrorists do you think exist in the sahil region if you dont mind, if if you have information on that, roughly . Yes, so if we are talking about how many terrorists in terms of individual numbers it is very difficult to get because they are a recruitment is on daily basis, they recruit on daily basis, they have sometimes ex this extremism, take a r guess, are we looking a thousand, 5,00, 2,000, how many do you think there are, it is in the tens of thousands, it is in their tens, not in the in 500 or an tens of thousands, because even alqaeda has more than five groups that are allied to it in the sahel, more than five groups, we have armtun, we have akim, we have ansaru. A whole lot of groups and then we have the isis group which is very active in southwestern niger and south east and okay let me let me let me move to our guess i just want to get a number from youtunda as what you heard heard what our guess there said um you have three countries that france was there with to help with the security situation you also have uh the fact that you have a biggest uh us drone base thats situated there uh called drone base uh, which is a nigerian air base, core components of the uh expanded us military socalled fight against terrorist to be one of his purposes, but yet they were not able to do that, and as our guests there said, seems like the terrorists are even expanding. Now the news is uh out uh whether the us is going to lose this base or not next year. Why do you think these countries in particular uh with the french being there, including the us were not able to defeat the terrorists . Well, um, frances failure and the us failure against terrorism is part of a broader um, i guess trend, you could say, right, the us and france and other nato countries claim that theyre in the sahel to secure the region against insurgent groups, but its no, its no secret right, that these groups are really tools um that lot of these forces used to destabilize countries in the sahel, we we can look back to the example of libya. Right, where uh, the us, france, and nato, funded, trained, uh, armed, right, insurgent groups throughout libya and and the and the region right, to destabilize the libyan government, right, and and there are uh, reports that have come out of the sahel that, france has been engaged in similar activities, since right, that this uh, this this coup in niger, and so you know, theres a lot of distrust. Amongst the people of the sahel in terms of the ability and the willingness and the purpose of uh i guess these military bases that the french and and the us have in the region. Right, lot, lot of folks have have even point pointed to the the idea that uh, theyve created this crisis by having these socalled insurgence attack, civilian uh populations that led to these african states inviting Foreign Military forces into their territories to help fight the violence from nonstate armed groups, there are New York Times articles going back to the libya uh conflict, speaking to this this trend of of you know the us and france arming and and funding and and training right these groups to to create instability thank you uh we could probably dedicate another program for this particular topic but were going to have to move on here and id like to ask you uh fidel if i may about the way that france uh has taken advantage of african countries uh in this case niger and in particular the this question comes about and the answer is well theyve taken advantage of it through for example the resource by the name of uranium okay but we need to break that open a little bit. First of all, how do you explain that where you have 90 of nigerians not having electricity based on what information we have, but yet selling uranium to france, and then were going to get into how they are taking advantage in that respect with the type of pricing theyre getting. Yeah, so uh, like ive always said, after independence, france did not really, really Pay Attention todays former colonies and the concentration was on french firms and french interests being pushed, resources being exploited and all that, but the the attention mostly the Political Class gained while the people suffered, and i have over the years written that while france liberalized his societies in its main societies in europe, in africa, they actually supported this Political Class to actually exploit their own countries, you can talk of cot divoir, you can talk of niger, you can talk of um mali, burkina faso and all other places. You remember in the 1980s when sankara decided to win himself, he actually met an untimely death and in fact france cannot say that i did not know anything about that, so france has been its own um evil in africa, and so that is major problem, however currently the people still need the support of their government, so whether military or civil. Taking over, the people will need the support of the of the leadership, they will need economic, the Socio Economic development, basic needs, and so i think that the military should pay their attention to providing for these, because in the long term, if the people do not get this, they will turn against the military as well, i dont see this as a black and white situation, yeah, the role that the cfa frank played needs to also be opened up here, because its quite incredible uh to how this uh really um took the sover. Away from these countries, in the case of niger and other countries that were former french colonies, the one that stands out um in some respects the top is how there was a requirement for the Member States to uh deposit a half of their Exchange Reserves into the french uh treasury plus another 20 from what we understand for financial liabilities, which means that they only had access to about 30 their money. Now this is just one of the ways that cfa frank uh scheme worked. Of which the french uh took advantage of and then uh redirected that money either to pay off their debt, which some say is lot of money or for them to reinvest in other areas and for them to make money, isnt that tat amount to what the accusation is, which is uh taking away a countrys sovereignty by enforcing this type of a scheme . Absolutely, um, the france f the cfa frank right, is a direct legacy of french colonial. It was established in 1945 in response to frances ratification of the Bretton Woods agreement right that you know established the imf and the world bank and also devalued the french frank and it refers to two separate but um interchangeable really currency unions the west african cfa frank and the Central African cfa frank and so despite their independence in the 1960s and 70s uh Something Like 14 francophone afrik chose to preserve close ties to france and preserve the usage of the cfa frank and like youre saying, it it has allowed france to to assert its will and control over uh lot of aspects of the monetary policy, really the economy in these countries right, and and its its a huge source of antifrench sentiment in the region, especially from African Youth right, which i think is key, key demographic right, given their their large population. In many many of these states uh and and and they see it really as a literal example of their countrys dependence on france and a lasting uh remnant of of the colonial period uh really aspect of neolonialism um and you know its not just folks in in these countries that are criticizing the the cfa frank its you know folks throughout uh uh europe we we saw um you know uh italian leaders like uh luigi de mayo uh uh you know allegging that well well just criticizing this this policy this colonial uh hangover um and i think its something that has to be removed if we want to see the end of french influence on west africa or if if if thats what the masses are looking for. Yeah, the the reason why were going to get into these issues as we are, um, fidel, is to understand how also french uh benefited from this to the point from african countries, the 14 that are former colonies, to the point where without them franch, france would not be or have the standing that it has in the world, as we know it. For example, looking at the uh french nationals that are present there in uh in africa, were looking at ariva and vince africa that have granted france access to these strategic resources. We talked about uranium and whats happening there, but we understand that there other uh resources like gabon, which is source of crude oil, mauritania, iron oil, togo and benin provide agricultural commodities, and uh, there are other resources that french is taking advantage of. Which we is called exploitation, gold, copper, diamond, boxide, timber, crude oil, uh, how to what degree was this happening, and how did this come about, and why is it that this uh, in some respects is still continuing . All right, so um, first of all we must um try and explain that um, countries investing in other countries is basically not wrong, if one country like lets say iran is investing in kenya as president raise came around in east africa, it is not wrong, but when that investment becomes exploitative to the people, then it becomes wrong, so iran is definitely going to have a winwin game with african countries, iran is definitely going to have Mutual Respect in a relationship, but when it becomes master servant relations as it happened in the 50s. After france was leaving africa, then it becomes exploitative, then it becomes asymmetrical, then you dont see any kind of equality or Mutual Respect, all you see is domination that one actor becomes more dominant in the other, and in the process the people suffer, because then the resources that have been extracted do not benefit the people, so if niger has uranium deposits and uranium is the main foel for. Nuclear uh energy, if you niger has that and it is not energy dependent, it does not have enough energy in the country and has to import from other countries, then it means that the relationship that it has has, it has had with eight formal colonial power has not been that that is mutual, has not been a winwin game, it has actually been a zero sum game, and so i think that the redefinition of the relationship between uh niger. And france is very necessary. I dont believe that france should be entirely cut off from niger because the International Community we need each other. We need to relate. However, that relationship must be based on Mutual Respect and must be based on the people gaining from their own resources and not someone being in paris benefiting more than the person name, the capital of niger. So in the sahel, i think that with it abundant resources, the sahel. Currently needs more partners that engage in mutual uh mutually Beneficial Contracts and investments so that the people benefit their living is is is is better and they have better life. Well okay, so thats a great point that you make there and id like to expand on that, the fact that african countries need uh more partners that uh basically um have a winwin. Uh type approach, and i think that was uh, thats just witnessed, that was actually witnessed when you had the bricks uh forum take place uh, where you there was an intense interest on african countries, 40 of them i believe, to want to join that organization, because african countries, and my question to you is, it appears that they are sick and tired of the way that the west has dealt with them, in particular, the topic of our discussion here being france, and maybe we could put uh the us in that picture also, us just seems to be behind. When it comes to france to africa anyways, because they just want to make sure their people are going to benefit also, is that a correct way of looking at it and hence explaining . Explains why african countries are now turning to organizations like bricks . I believe so, so im sorry, this is for guess in atlanta. Tunda, go ahead, sorry, i believe so. Yeah, no, um, i, i think uh, you know, the attitude of france and the us and other western countries towards uh, lot of many african countries, lot of their former colonies, uh, has been one of paternalism, right, since the independence of many states and africa, france and the us and others have maintained substantial economic and military domination right of these of these countries. We could look back to um the the berlin conference in the uh late 1800s where uh many western countries came together and and uh decided which of of the uh of the african continent, which which parts of the continent they would dominate, right . And so i think a lot of those uh uh types of attitudes and and relationships have been maintained, even postindependence, and like you said right, like lot of african countries they want to have uh uh you know mutually beneficial relationships with with with uh partners throughout throughout the world like like my uh uh my my uh fellow uh speaker here has has shared right like we need each other right in this in this World Economy uh states need to uh cooperate and and and Work Together uh but the way that the west is is acting is is i think the the development in in bricks is is positive uh though i i think there theres a lot more that needs to be done in order for uh these countries uh uh to to assert their own uh um you know mutually beneficial ways of of operating with other other states and and that includes uh working to end um you know the these uh neocolonial ways of relating uh removing lot of these dependent leaders or or leaders who are acting oftentimes in the interest the west of of uh Foreign Countries of uh instead of in the interest of their people and so i think that thats one thing we need to to overcome. All right, last question here uh in a minute if you can, um, fidel, the former president jack shark uh said that france without uh exploiting africa would lose its global standing um and that without africa france will slide down into the rank of a third world power. Do you agree . Yes, so um, he was actually. Talking about the fact that you know african colonies, french african colonies, when hitler invaded um france, it was the french colonies that really supported the Free French Movement that was based in london, the exile government in london, it was the colonies, they actually supplied them with lot of cash, lot of resources in order to uh resist hitler, and after the war, france will not let them go, and so they arranged what we call the french community. Or for francophony in order to keep those resources still streaming in europe, and in fact that has not benefited the african, thats the most important thing about his scoot that if africa should stop supplying france with resources and france is going to collapse, then it means that the relationship between africa and its france and its formal colonies is not that that is fair and so it should be fair, that is all right, thank you very much, were going to unfortunately have to end it there. Fidel amisu, internationals and security analyst from akra, and thank you tunde osa, africa team member at black alliance for peace from atlanta. Thank you to you both. With that we come to an end for this edition of the spotlight. For me, and the team, its goodbye. 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