Is Francafrique ending? Why Senegal is cutting military ties with France

In Senegal, a country bustling with French-owned businesses and nationals, President Bassirou Diomaye Faye’s recent announcement that France should shut down its military bases should have come as a surprise. Yet, analysts say, it was a move that was always going to come.

In November, Faye asked Paris to remove some 350 French troops stationed on Senegalese soil, effectively ending a defence pact that had existed for decades and continuing a trend that has seen many West African nations sever or downgrade once-strong ties with former coloniser France in recent years.

In an interview with the AFP news agency, the Senegalese president – who was elected earlier this year on the back of a nationalistic campaign that promised to review Dakar’s relations with Paris – said France’s continued military presence in the country was not compatible with Senegal’s sovereignty.

“Senegal is an independent country, it is a sovereign country and sovereignty does not accept the presence of military bases in a sovereign country,” Faye said, speaking from the presidential palace in Dakar. Faye did not give a deadline for when the soldiers needed to leave.

The move came as Senegal marked the 80th anniversary of the mass killings of West African soldiers by colonial forces on the morning of December 1, 1944. The men, West African soldiers of the Tirailleurs Senegalais unit who fought in France’s war against Nazi Germany, had been protesting delays in salaries and poor living conditions when colonial soldiers fired on them.

Although the two nations have had cordial relations since Senegal’s independence, the killings have always been a wound that France kept quiet about until 2012. French authorities attempted to bury the evidence and claimed 35 people were killed, although scholars estimate 400 people died.

Then-president Francois Hollande admitted France’s culpability in 2012. However, President Emmanuel Macron this year, in a letter to President Faye, admitted that France committed a “massacre”.

Beverly Ochieng, a Dakar-based researcher with intelligence firm Control Risks, told Al Jazeera that Senegal’s government cutting military ties on the anniversary of the massacre was in line with election promises that Faye, along with Prime Minister Ousmane Sonko – an outspoken France critic – had made.

“Senegal is going through a lot of reforms under the two leaders, and they are really questioning just how much of a stake they have in their own country,” Ochieng said.

“For Faye, he doesn’t just want France to occupy space in military bases when Senegal cannot go and do the same.”

From Senegal to Chad, Francafrique disappears

Increasing anti-French sentiments in former French colonies have seen France suffer diplomatic blows across the West and Central African region as its once-influential “Francafrique” sphere rapidly shrinks.

Many governments and citizens, especially in the military-led countries of the Sahel, detest France’s real and perceived political interference in their countries. They see France as paternalistic for its deep involvement in sectors like mining and for its inability to decisively halt the spread of armed groups, despite thousands of French soldiers stationed in the region.

Ruling military groups in Mali, Burkina Faso, and Niger collectively ejected some 4,300 French soldiers from their countries in 2022, after France refused to back the coups that brought them to power, with thousands of citizens rallying in their support. Those countries have since turned to Russian mercenaries for help with battling a swarm of armed groups seeking to gain territory in the volatile region.

On November 29, the same day Faye called on French troops to leave Senegal, the central African country of Chad also severed military ties with France, ending a defence pact that had existed since 1960 and catching Paris flat-footed. This week, the withdrawal started with two fighter jets leaving N’djamena.

Chad, located in a surveillance “sweet spot” close to the Sahel, war-torn Sudan and Libya, was regarded as the last remaining ally in the Sahel for Western governments. It was also the one rebellion that France supported after President Mahamat Deby forcefully took power in 2021.

However, experts say multiple triggers caused N’djamena to pull back this time, including reports that France withheld intelligence information that led to 40 Chadian soldiers being killed by armed group Boko Haram in October.

Despite Teraanga, a sore relationship

What differentiates Senegal from the rest of the batch is that it’s the only country severing ties with France where a military government is not in power. Senegal is also one of the African countries where France has most integrated itself, making the eventual divorce trickier, experts say.

In sunny, coastal Dakar where a culture of “Teraanga” (or hospitality) attracts and welcomes international expatriates, French presence is unmistakable, and French nationals freely mix with locals at restaurants, markets and events. TOTAL petrol stations, booths belonging to telecom company Orange, and Auchan supermarkets dot the city and account for about 25 percent of Senegal’s gross domestic product, according to France’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs.

However, analysts say the spread of anti-France anger from the neighbouring Sahel countries, and the rise of young, new-age politicians like Sonko, who in the past has made incendiary statements against France and Senegalese leaders considered cosy with Paris, have seen people in Senegal become hostile.

Protesters in 2023 targeted French businesses, looting and burning stores after Sonko, who was an opposition leader at the time, was detained on rape charges by the government of former President Macky Sall. Sonko, who said the charges were politically motivated, was acquitted of rape but imprisoned for “corrupting the youth”, stripping him of his eligibility to run as president, which prompted his colleague, Faye, to stand in his place.

During their campaign in February, the duo promised more transparency and said they’d review extractive contracts with Western-owned businesses, including French and other European firms.

They also pledged that Senegal would not work with Western lenders, and that it would cease to use the CFA franc, a currency used by 14 mainly former French colonies in sub-Saharan Africa and seen as the most evident symbol of France’s neocolonialism. But those seem better said than done, analysts say.

“They have quietly let the CFA question die down, and there is no renegotiations of the extractive contracts with foreign companies that they had promised,” Oumar Ba, international politics professor at Cornell University told Al Jazeera.

They’ve also continued to work with lenders like the World Bank and International Monetary Fund as the economy slowed this year, Ba pointed out.

“I think evoking the low-hanging fruit of the French military presence participates to only keeping the symbolic sovereigntist discourse alive,” he said.

Some analysts say Faye is more likely to push for the realisation of the “Eco” – a proposed West African common currency that’s in development.

 A new relationship

France’s deteriorating relationships with its former African allies, including Senegal, have seen it rethink its alliances in the region by downgrading its already toppling military architecture to focus on other sectors such as business.

Paris, earlier this year, committed to reducing its troop numbers from 350 to 100 in Senegal and Gabon, and from 600 to 100 in Ivory Coast. Before Chad ejected French troops in November, Paris had planned to reduce their numbers from 1,000 to 300.

Instead, France is pivoting to economic relations and is engaging more African countries outside its traditional sphere of influence. In November, President Macron welcomed Nigeria’s President Bola Ahmed Tinubu to the Elysee Palace and even spoke the colloquial Nigerian pidgin English in his welcoming address.

“They need new friends and they need powerful friends,” Ochieng said. “If they can have a giant like Nigeria, then they can still hold on,” she added. Important West African economies like Ivory Coast, Gabon, and Benin are still friendly with Paris.

For Senegal, President Faye has hinted that the once ultra-close relations the country had with France will also stay more in the business space, clarifying that severing military ties does not mean ending trade.

“France remains an important partner for Senegal,” he told reporters. “Today, China is our largest trading partner in terms of investment and trade. Does China have a military presence in Senegal? No. Does that mean our relations are cut? No,” he said.

However, the president also wants reparations for the Thiaroye murders. In addition to France shutting its military bases, Faye said he would demand a formal apology from France. Such an apology would require France to make amends, which could translate into monetary compensation for the families of the victims.

PM Sonko has long pushed for reparations for the killings. In June, as France celebrated its liberation from Nazi Germany, he criticised Paris’s move to officially recognise six of the murdered West African soldiers with the honour of “Died for France”, a title awarded to people who died in service of the country. It’s unclear why the six had been singled out.

“It is not up to [France] to unilaterally decide the number of Africans who were betrayed and murdered after helping to save it, nor the type and extent of the recognition and reparations they deserve,” Sonko posted on Facebook, signing the message as the head of the governing PASTEF party, rather than as head of government.

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