Africa's silence and insularity are inviting foreign control: Justice Malala

Key topics:African leaders fail to unite against rising coups and economic crisesForeign powers fill leadership void, striking self-serving dealsAU's weakness hampers response to Trump-era tariffs and conflicts.Sign up for your early morning brew of the BizNews Insider to keep you up to speed with the content that matters. The newsletter will land in your inbox at 5:30am weekdays. Register here.Support South Africa's bastion of independent journalism, offering balanced insights on investments, business, and the political economy, by joining BizNews Premium. Register here.If you prefer WhatsApp for updates, sign up to the BizNews channel here..*By Justice Malala.Africa’s brutal coups and wars of the late 20th century, largely eradicated in the early 2000s due to visionary leadership, are making a comeback. Old wars, such as the conflict in the eastern Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC), are being rekindled. Tensions between Ethiopia and South Sudan are flaring up after periods of peace. Military coups reminiscent of the 1970’s have resumed in west Africa. Meanwhile, the protectionisms, divisions, and geopolitical contests of the Cold War are resurgent as the US ruthlessly implements President Donald Trump’s America First policies. As Africans endure conflict or the burden of strained economies, the continent’s leaders and multilateral organizations have fallen silent, failed to respond effectively to shared challenges and left a gaping leadership vacuum. Powerful countries and their leaders have turned inward to resolve domestic political and economic challenges; South Africa’s coalition government, for example, teeters on the brink of collapse. Kenya’s President William Ruto faces internal challenges and a restive youth, Nigeria battles a slowing economy and jihadist insurgencies, while Egypt’s attention is on Middle Eastern problems. The same lack of cohesion and unity is apparent in responses to continent-wide economic challenges. When Trump unleashed his so-called Liberation Day tariff regime, there was no coordinated voice from a continent which has a formal trade pact — the Africa Growth and Opportunity Act (AGOA), supposed to help economies develop through preferential access to US markets — with the country. Instead, nations responded as they saw fit: Nigeria’s central bank sold nearly $200 million to prop up its local currency, the naira, while South Africa sat tight and said it would not “act out of spite.”No African multilateral institution has spoken for the likes of the tiny southern African kingdom of Lesotho, one of the world’s poorest nations with annual gross domestic product of just $2 billion, on which Trump slapped a 50% tariff. To appease the US, Lesotho has hastily signed a licensing agreement with Starlink — whose owner, Elon Musk, is Trump’s adviser — and offered to “explore accepting … deportees from the United States.” Eswatini, Libya, Rwanda and Benin are considering similar offers. These countries are flying solo, with no guidance from continental leaders or the African Union. One would think that there would be far greater motivation for continental co-operation and responses given that Trump’s now-paused tariff gambit effectively killed AGOA, a move which will deeply harm or destroy economies like Lesotho’s. African leaders and multilateral institutions such as the AU are unable to prevent or stop these flaring conflicts or respond to economic or political challenges posed by the Trump administration’s ascendance and policies. Instead, foreign powers are leading peace attempts and are at the same time staking claims to Africa’s wealth – sometimes with the aid of the continent’s weakened and desperate leaders. The DRC’s embattled leader, President Felix Tshisekedi, has been hawking his country’s mineral wealth to anyone who will keep him in power, including offering mines for security to the US. Qatar, a nonentity in African politics, is mediating the conflict in the eastern DRC after African leaders failed to make headway and instead ended up threatening each other with war. Russia has agreed to provide arms and military training to a joint force between Mali, Niger, and Burkina Faso — all led by military dictators who have defied AU attempts to herd them to democracy. The Sudan war has seen the US, Saudi Arabia, and Turkey mediate after Egyptian, Kenyan, the AU and other African groupings tried and failed. Turkey, for example, already has extensive roles in Somalia — it mediated the country’s dispute with Ethiopia in 2024 — as well as in coup-ridden Niger, and Algeria. Where are Africa’s leaders, the African Union, and other institutions when the continent clearly needs them most? Angola’s João Lourenço, whose efforts to resolve the DRC conflict collapsed last month, took over as AU chairman in February. He said his intention is “to put an end to conflicts in Africa, address the challenges of unconstitutional changes of government, terrorism, and other challenges.” He’s well aware of the problem he faces. In March, he said: “We should be ashamed of the fact that institutions outside Africa, such as the European Union or the United Nations Security Council, are sometimes more rigorous, demanding and forceful in their positions than we are in dealing with the conflicts taking place on our own continent.” One hopes he can replicate what the continent achieved in 2000 when the AU’s Lomé Declaration outlawed coups and gave the organization authority to sanction anti-democratic leaders. The Stockholm International Peace Research Institute writes that “after 2000 there was a constant decline in the number of conflicts in Africa”. In 2005 only three conflicts — the lowest for the region in the post-cold war period — were recorded from a high of eleven in 1998/99. The Geneva Academy puts the number of armed conflicts in Africa today at 35. Successes like those of the 2000s will not be repeated unless African leaders urgently rejuvenate their vision for the continent. They need to strengthen the AU, empower regional bodies such as the Economic Community of West African States and act in unity to address the continent’s challenges. In a vastly changed world, with challenges everywhere, Africa’s leaders need to put serious effort into making the expression “African solutions for African problems” a reality. © 2025 Bloomberg L.P.

Africa's silence and insularity are inviting foreign control: Justice Malala

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