'New era' for Africa, France
Shaun Benton
29 February 2008French President Nicolas Sarkozy promised a wide-ranging and comprehensive review of France's defence agreements with several African countries as he addressed a joint sitting of South Africa's Parliament in Cape Town on Thursday.
The French president, who arrived for a two-day state visit to the country on Thursday, made the announcement after talks with President Thabo Mbeki.
He said the review of France's defence agreements - the country maintains a military presence in several of its former African colonies - "must reflect Africa as it is today and not as it was yesteryear".
It was because of this need to bring France's Africa policy up to date with the 21st century, he said, that he had refused to allow "a single French soldier to fire a single shot against an African" during the recent rebel-inspired turbulence in Chad.
New defence agreements "must rest on the strategic interests of France and its partners," Sarkozy said, adding that new agreements would be made after dialogue that took full account of the wishes of African states for a "new strategic partnership".
In addition, "all defence agreements between France and African countries must be made public in their entirety," he said, signalling a major shift towards openness in France's foreign relations.
The French parliament would also become more closely involved in setting out the guidelines for French policy in Africa, with any French military presence in Africa serving "first and foremost" to help Africa achieve its own collective security arrangements.
South Africa has been moving over the past few years towards building up Africa's capacity for regional and continent-wide peacekeeping, in a bid to end the conflicts that have stunted development in Africa.
Sarkozy said France would be willing to assist the African Union with its objective of having standby forces by 2012. Any downgrading of France's military presence in Africa would be more than matched by an increase in economic capacity-building assistance, he said.
The French president also announced a three-part initiative to spur economic growth in Africa, to be led by the Groupe Agence Francaise de Developpement (AFD) - the French Development Agency - while being open to other partners.
The first component of this will be a €250-million investment fund that will acquire holdings in other funds in order to develop African companies.
The second element, involving a further €250-million, will be a guarantee fund to provide for risk-sharing for small African companies seeking finance, and is likely to be implemented by AFD's private sector arm Proparco.
The third element will be a doubling of AFD activity in support of the private sector, with a €2-billion commitment over five years.
The three elements add up to a €2.5-billion commitment which, combined with others, bring total French commitment to sub-Saharan Africa to €10-billion over next five years.
Another issue raised by the French president was that of immigration, which he said was not a "satisfactory" reality, noting that South Africa was also experiencing large, often uncontrolled, inflows of migrants.
With as many as 500 000 people entering Europe illegally each year, the French president proposed an African-European partnership on migration, saying that "we cannot handle migratory flows on a one-sided basis".
France would prepare an annual quota of migrants which would be debated and voted on each year in the country's parliament, he said, as well as negotiated with countries of origin as part of agreements covering coordinated flows of people.
The French president said this could also help to counter the Africa "brain-drain", noting that there were more doctors from Benin working in France than in their home country.
The situation of African elites emigrating on a permanent basis should be avoided, he said, pointing out that this disturbed the development of African nations themselves while sometimes placing a burden on receiving countries.
Finally, Sarkozy praised South Africa as a beacon of hope, with the country emerging relatively peacefully as a non-racial, non-sexist, progressive democracy with an emphasis on human rights at the close of a century that was plagued by vicious wars.
South Africa's message of humanity and reconciliation should serve to guide current generations, who bore the heavy responsibility of ensuring that the humanitarian disasters of the previous century were not repeated, he said.
Source: BuaNews
