Africa Forward Summit 2026: France’s two-faced Presence in Africa

France cannot decide the image it wants to present in Africa; after burning down West Africa, it is pretending to champion the autonomy, sovereignty, and prosperity of East Africa.

A New Scramble for Africa

The Africa Forward Summit, 2026

During the aforementioned Africa Forward Summit, the French president engaged in a flurry of activities designed to show appreciation for Kenyans, including jogging alongside renowned Kenyan athletes and engaging with Kenyan content creators, an image that differs from how France relates with Francophone Africa. France’s actions in West Africa have impoverished millions, as has been noted by, among others, the sitting Italian Prime Minister, Giorgia Meloni. In 2022, Meloni displayed a photo showing a child mining gold in Burkina Faso and explained how France’s imposing of its colonial currency, the CFA franc, enables it to control over 50% of Burkinabe’s wealth, which impoverished the Sahelian country. She added that Burkina Faso’s gold ended up in France’s state vaults, which makes the economic life in the African country hopeless. France is also known to have taken control of Nigerian uranium mining over the decades and obtained the resource at a throwaway price, enriching itself with nuclear energy while Niger remained poor. Previously, France obtained about 20% of its uranium needs from Niger and derived about 70% of its electricity needs from nuclear, while Niger remained trapped in poverty and underdeveloped, even in the regions from which France mined uranium. France also exploits Mali,........

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