Article: The Time Is Right for a Pivot to Africa

I discuss how Africa is not a battlefield for competition with China and Russia. We must see African aid, development, and investment as worthy security projects in their own right – in this article for Proceedings.

Article: How American diplomacy can help Guinea's people

I discuss how the U.S. can build influence with Guinea’s new regime – and try to help Guineans overcome poverty, corruption, and a cycle of repressive dictatorships – in this article for The Hill.

Bublup Roll: Crises in the Sahel

Photo by Daniel Tiveau/CIFOR

The Sahel – a region spanning the African continent laterally, just under the Sahara Desert – is experiencing one of the world's most dire arrays of crises. Violent extremism, political instability, economic desperation, the effects of climate change, and COVID-19 are all threatening the Sahel at once. In this Roll, I grapple with some of the region's greatest challenges, and how the international community can make a difference there.

How the US can pull Sudan back from the brink

For The Hill, I discuss how U.S. policy towards Sudan can make a difference as the country struggles to move past the Bashir years.

How COVID-19 Is Affecting African Economies

Lagos at night. By Chukwuka Tolulope Obu from Wikimedia Commons.

So far, there have been fewer COVID-19 cases and deaths in Africa than expected. But the pandemic has resulted in major resource problems.

African communities and governments mobilized quickly to fight COVID-19. Many countries have successfully imposed lockdowns and quarantines in order to limit community transmission. Nevertheless, cases and deaths continue to increase across the continent.

In addition to the disease itself, the coronavirus has brought deep economic hardship to Africa in three key ways.

• Prices for African commodity exports have decreased dramatically because of reduced economic activity in industrialized nations. This has reduced government revenue available for public health and pandemic management.

• Africans living in the industrialized world in diaspora communities normally send remittances to their families in Africa. Because so many workers have lost their jobs in the United States and Europe, these remittances have been greatly reduced. This has made it increasingly difficult for African families to purchase food and other necessities, which are especially important in the pandemic. Most African workers can't afford to miss a single day of work – stockpiling food and everyday essentials is typically not an option in the best of times.

• The uncertainties of COVID-19 have resulted in capital flight from Africa, further reducing the resources available to manage the pandemic, alleviate suffering, and control the economic fallout.

The complex impact of COVID-19 on Africa requires a multifaceted response. One of the most important contributions that the U.S. government can make is to supply surplus food under the P.L. 480 program, which allows African nations to purchase U.S. food exports in their own local currency. Use of P.L. 480 as part of a broader food aid program would go a long way towards ameliorating the widespread hunger which Africa is facing as a consequence of the pandemic.

Pulling Troops Out of Africa Could Mean Another Endless War

In this article for War on the Rocks, I discuss the potential consequences of the proposed reduction in U.S. military support for Africa – and why troops and arms are not enough on their own.

Response to Economist article

Below is my response to The Economist’s February 20 article, “How America deals with Africa, despite Donald Trump.”

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Your report on the Trump Administration's policy toward Africa (February 20) missed the main point. Trump came into office determined to reverse everything that Obama had done. But, he has left intact, and has fully funded, Obama's two very creative projects in Africa: "Power Africa" and "Feed the Future". The former has already increased power generation in Africa by 30 thousand megawatts, and the latter has increased food crops considerably in Nigeria. In addition, Trump sent Nikki Haley, his first Ambassador to the UN, to the Democratic Republic of the Congo in 2018 to persuade former President Kabila to stop delaying the election, and to promise not to run himself. This has opened the door in the DRC to democracy for the first time in its history. Also, of course, the Bush (43) program to control and reduce the prevalence of HIV/AIDS, and the Clinton AGOA program, to encourage African exports to the U.S. also have Trump's continuing support. Trump's own new project to encourage U.S. private investment, "Prosper Africa", has been slow to get started. But Secretary of State Pompeo brought two major U.S. corporations to Senegal recently where they signed two investment memoranda of understanding. Finally, Trump's offer to mediate between Egypt and Ethiopia over the latter's construction of a major dam that threatens to reduce the volume of Blue Nile water going to Egypt, and its one hundred million people, is an important effort to avoid a shooting war between these two major African powers. Despite Trump's initial nasty depiction of African countries two years ago, his actual policy is really quite constructive.

Statement on Cameroon

In recent days, press coverage misstating my position, and rumors, have circulated indicating I will be representing the Cameroonian separatists identifying themselves as an interim government of “Ambazonia” in their upcoming talks with Paul Biya’s government.

This is untrue. I do not represent Ambazonia in any way, and I will not be participating in the talks.

I do hope that the dialogue between the Biya administration and the Anglophone separatists leads to peace. The Swiss government’s mechanism for mediation is an excellent option, which I hope both sides will assent to.

US-Africa Engagement Remains Strong (Response to Howard French)

I am a longtime admirer of Howard French’s reporting from, and commentary about, Africa. Nevertheless, I must take issue with his op-ed of July 17, in which he describes US policy toward Africa as “absentee diplomacy.” His statement that since the end of the Cold War, “the US has become more and more disengaged from Africa” does not conform to reality. Each U.S. President since that time has created new, signature Africa programs of their own, with transformative results for African people.

In the immediate aftermath of the Cold War, George H.W. Bush’s administration was heavily engaged in conflict resolution in Africa. Between 1989 and 1993, the US played the principal role in negotiations, in which I participated, leading to the end of major long-running civil wars in Ethiopia, Angola, and Mozambique. 

President Bill Clinton signed into law the Africa Growth and Opportunity Act (AGOA), which today remains the major trade and investment vehicle linking Africa and the U.S.

President George W. Bush inaugurated several major programs in Africa. His PEPFAR program has saved tens of millions of African lives threatened by HIV, tuberculosis, and malaria. His establishment of the Millennium Challenge Corporation has resulted in major infrastructure improvements across Africa. President Bush also persuaded the World Bank to stop charging African countries interest when borrowing from their IDA soft loan window.

President Obama started two very innovative programs in Africa: “Power Africa,” designed to attract private investment to the continent’s woefully deficient electricity infrastructure; and his “Feed the Future” program, helping to modernize African agriculture in order to lower the continent’s very large food import bill, and end hunger among Africans.

President Obama also hosted a 2016 summit of African heads of state in Washington, where they were introduced to the leading CEOs of American industry. Significant networking took place at that meeting. Obama’s ground-breaking frank talk about ending corruption and bad governance was also highly significant. 

Despite the leak of President Trump’s insulting private remark about African countries, and despite his tendency to reverse President Obama’s policies in other areas, Trump's policy toward Africa has also been positive. President Trump has continued his predecessors' programs on the continent – the Obama programs remain in place and are funded.

President Trump should also be credited with a significant diplomatic achievement in the Democratic Republic of the Congo. Unable to change the constitution so that he could run for a third term, President Joseph Kabila conveniently failed to hold the presidential elections scheduled for November 2016. President Trump sent UN Ambassador Nikki Haley to the Congo, where she was able to persuade all parties to hold an election in December of 2018. This election resulted in the first democratic transfer of power in the Congo since its independence in 1960.

In the economic arena, National Security Advisor John Bolton announced in December 2018 the establishment of President Trump’s “Prosper Africa” program, designed to attract and assist American companies looking to invest in Africa. The Trump administration correctly sees a growing private sector as Africa’s best path to economic growth and poverty reduction.

Among his personnel selections, President Trump’s appointment of Ambassador Tibor Nagy as Assistant Secretary of State for Africa could not have been better. Nagy is a 35-year veteran of the U.S. Foreign Service, with ambassadorships in Ethiopia and Guinea. His first year in office has been marked by a frank and fruitful dialogue with African leaders. 

All of the above is a far cry from the accusation of US disengagement from Africa.

Apollo 11

Vendredi, j’ai discuté le 50ème anniversaire d’Apollo 11 sur VOA Afrique: https://www.voaafrique.com/a/4987463.html

Clarification

J'ai récemment rendu publique une lettre que j'ai écrite à la Cour Pénale Internationale (CPI) pour demander la libération de Jean-Pierre Bemba. Je pense que le temps qu'il a passé en prison constitue jusqu'à présent une peine suffisante pour le crime pour lequel il a été condamné.

Certains observateurs congolais ont interprété ma déclaration comme un signal que le gouvernement américain ne considère pas les candidats de l'opposition Felix Tshisekedi et Moïse Katumbi comme suffisamment qualifiés pour être candidats à la présidence, et que je demande la libération de M. Bemba comme étant le plus qualifié.

Il n'y a pas de vérité dans cette interprétation. Ni le gouvernement américain, ni moi, n'avons aucune préférence quant aux candidats aux élections en RDC. Nous travaillons tous pour encourager une élection libre et juste. Au sein du Département d'Etat américain, Felix Tshisekedi et Moïse Katumbi sont considérés comme de bons candidats avec de bonnes opportunités d'être élus. Il y a d'autres candidats forts dans différents partis.

Notre objectif principal est que les élections libres et équitables soient organisées conformément à l’ACCORD DE LA SYLVESTRE. Ni plus, ni moins.

Clarifying Letter to the ICC

I have recently made public a letter that I wrote to the International Criminal Court pleading for the release of Jean-Pierre Bemba. I feel that the time he has spent in prison so far constitutes sufficient punishment for the crime for which he was convicted.

Some Congolese observers have interpreted my statement as a signal that the American Government does not consider opposition candidates Felix Tshisekedi and Moïse Katumbi as being sufficiently qualified to be presidential candidates, and that I am seeking Mr. Bemba's liberation as suggesting that he would be more qualified.

There is no truth to this interpretation. Neither the US Government, nor I, have preferred candidates in the DRC election. We both are working to encourage a free and fair election. In the US State Department, Felix Tshisekedi and Moïse Katumbi are considered strong candidates with good opportunities to be elected. There are other strong candidates in different parties.

Our main objective is that free and fair elections be held in accordance with the Saint-Sylvestre Agreement. Nothing more, nothing less.