Mr President, Good morning. I am still pre-occupied with your French dance. I will give you more information in today’s piece to enable you to navigate the most deadly imperial power. I have elected to call France, Jackal, after the fashion of Frederick Forsyth’s political thriller, The Day of the Jackal. Described as historical fiction, it has the element of reality glimpsed from Jean-Marie Bastien-Thiry’s attempt to assassinate de Gaulle on August 22, 1962.
The qualification of the Jackal, an assassin and protagonist in the work, by Goodreads’ review is apt. The Jackal is described as “A tall, blond Englishman with opaque, gray eyes. A killer at the top of his profession. A man unknown to any secret service in the world”. This is one good way to describe France and its imperial infamy.
The Jackal has perpetrated historical injustices against Africa and continues to do so. Easily recalled is the Thiaroye Massacre over which many African soldiers, largely an infantry unit of Senegalese in the French army were massacred in cold blood at the Thiaroye military camp on 1 December 1944. Many were the veterans of the Battle of France where the Germans outflanked the French forces and took many prisoners. The protest over the poor living conditions and backlog of wages was their sin.
The decolonisation process was strewn with injustices, and the Jackal executed a deadly neo-colonial template, which Arikana Chihombori-Quao, former African Union Representative to the United States, who was The Guardian 2019 Person of the Year, captured that dynamic. She noted that “The government of France has significant control over all their former colonies, specifically 14 of them. When they were giving them independence, they forced them to sign a document which they called the pact for the continuation of colonisation. On one hand, they say we are giving you independence which comes out to be political independence but that you have to sign this document… You are going to be independent, but you have to agree to continually be colonised. Two countries said, absolutely not, they (were) not going to sign the document. They are Mali and Guinea. What the French did was that, they entered those countries, took everything that they thought they brought into those economies, poured concrete into sewage pipes and completely devastated the two economies. They did this to let other countries know that if they (did) not sign this document, this (was) the fate that (awaited them). She further averred that “The impact (was) terrible.
The pact that those countries had to deposit 85 per cent of their bank reserves with the French Central Bank, under the control of the French Minister of Finance and should those countries wish to request some of those monies – remember they are only left with 15 per cent of their reserves – they have to submit financial statement for the country and if approved, they can only access up 20 per cent of whatever they had deposited year before as a loan at commercial interest rate. The only difference now is the 85 per cent deposits have now been lowered down to maybe 50 and 60 per cent but the countries are still forced and required to deposit their bank reserves with the French Central Bank…Now, picture this situation: you are depositing your monies with France.
Should you need some of your money, you get it as a loan at commercial interest rates. Immediately, you have credit with France, but you begin to owe France! This has been going on and continuous till this day. So, combined, the 14 countries are giving to France cash of over $500 billion every year and France takes that money and invests it in its own stock market under the French name… currently, for every 14 billion that France takes out of Africa, by the time they finish investing it in the French stock market, they realise upwards of $300 billion so you do the maths to see how much France takes out of Africa every year” (https://pmnewsnigeria.com/2023/08/14/how-france-still-keeps-former-african-colonies-in-bondage/).
Need we forget the testing of its nuclear bomb in the Sahara Desert in 1960? It was done with total disregard for African lives that a moderate Tafawa Balewa, the Nigerian Prime Minister, had to sever diplomatic relations with the Jackal.
Today, the Jackal maintains a stream of military bases in Africa. For example, in Chad, it has about 1,000 troops, known as the French forces in Chad (EFT). In Djibouti, 1,500 soldiers quartered since 1977. In Gabon, it has about 350 troops otherwise called French Elements in Gabon (EFG) stationed since 1960, complemented with an air base at Guy Pidoux. Ivory Coast hosts its Forward Operating Base (Fob) while Senegal hosts about 400 soldiers, otherwise known as French Elements of Senegal (EFS). The unit has access to the city’s military airport and maintains a high-frequency radio transmitting station at Rufisque (https://www.bbc.com/news/world-africa-67278027). The movement to reclaim sovereignty has seen the issuance of a quit order by erstwhile colonies of Niger, Mali, Burkina Faso, and lately Senegal and Chad.
Africa provides the Jackal with resources and a platform to project its power as a ‘great power’. Prof. Tony Chafer, of the University of Portsmouth in the UK, has argued, “In an increasingly multipolar and competitive global environment, France has a primary geopolitical interest in maintaining its military presence in the region … [it] plays a key role in justifying France’s permanent seat on the UN Security Council – France is an ‘essential actor’ when security issues in West and Central Africa are discussed at the UN or the international community” (https://www.bbc.com/news/world-africa-67278027).
The Jackal’s electricity is based on about 70 per cent uranium, and mines much of it from Africa.
Africa has about 32 per cent of the world’s bauxite; 38 per cent of the world’s uranium; 40 per cent of the world’s gold; 51.6 per cent of the world’s diamonds; 20 per cent of the world’s titanium; 90 per cent of the world’s chromium and platinum; cobalt, 70 per cent and 12 per cent of world oil. Guinea alone harbours 22 per cent of the world’s bauxite and its total budget is put at 0.99995 per cent of that of the Jackal. The continent has no reason to be poor; it must free itself from the imperial stranglehold of the Jackal and its ilk.
Odion-Akhaine is professor of political science, Lagos State University.
