Spain is pursuing Africa as a strategic partner with its Africa Focus 2023 plan
Africa continues to offer attractive diplomatic and economic opportunities to external partners: On Monday 29 March, Spain launched its plan to increase economic engagement and general presence in Africa when Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez presented the “Africa Focus 2023”. The plan also aims to address the challenges set out in the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development. The Ghanaian President Nana Akufo-Addo, the President of the African Development Bank Akinwumi Adesina, Kenya’s head of trade, and Foreign Ministers from Senegal and Ghana took part in the launch of Africa Focus 2023 in Madrid. Sanchez plans to continue the launch with visits to Angola and Senegal later this month.
Until recently, Spain’s initiatives in Africa have focused on security, human rights, governance, poverty and combating social exclusion. In recent years, Spain’s relations with Africa have mainly focused on North Africa. With the Africa Focus 2023 plan, however, more countries are aiming to get involved in economic growth, peace and security, and development initiatives. For example, the plan highlights relationships with countries in the Sahel, the West African coast and the Gulf of Guinea for peace and security efforts. It highlights Morocco, Algeria, Rwanda, Tanzania and Ghana in the economic field. The master plan for Spanish cooperation 2018-21 also targets Mali, Niger, Senegal, Ethiopia and Mozambique as development cooperation countries.
Despite Sanchez’s drive to seek commercial opportunities for Spanish companies, Politico said, the plan has met with reluctance from Spanish business leaders amid concerns over political instability and corruption. Importantly, Sanchez has emphasized that the African Continental Free Trade Act (AfCFTA) can be of great importance to Spanish companies.
In addition to the above goals, Spain hopes to curb migration through economic growth in the region. According to the Associated Press, given that thousands of African migrants made the risky and often fatal journey to Europe through Spain, Spain has worked with North African countries to contain the tide. Indeed, at launch, Sanchez stated that “lack of opportunity” is a driving force for African migrants and that Spanish investments there could create reasons to stay.
Spain isn’t the only European country speeding up its trade ties with the region: the UK that emerged from Brexit is also turning to the growing region to strengthen economic ties. Early last year, London hosted a UK-Africa summit with the promise to be the G7’s largest investor in Africa by 2022. However, efforts in the UK have not been universally welcomed: according to Bond, a UK network of organizations working on international development, the UK-Africa summit overlooked issues such as sustainable development and ignored the role of African civil society in the process calmly.
For more information on opportunities for the UK in Africa, please visit the blog of Chuku Chuku, OIC manager and forecaster at the African Development Bank. “The ABC triangle provides an opportunity for an interesting deferral of the relationship between Britain and Africa.”
Technology expansions in Kenya and South Africa
Last week Safaricom launched its 5G network in Kenya. This makes the East African country the second in sub-Saharan Africa to have started such a network. South Africa was the first country where Vodacom started rolling out its 5G network in May 2020. As in South Africa, the launch of the new 5G network in Kenya will be done in stages, starting with individuals and companies in Nairobi, Kisumu, USA. Kisii and Kakamega. Safaricom intends to expand access to 150 locations in nine cities in the coming year. Experts hope the technology will bridge the digital divide in the region, which has become more apparent in the face of COVID-19 lockdowns, leading to increased reliance on the internet in all walks of life. 5G networks offer data speeds up to 100 times faster than 4G and can support up to 1 million connected devices per square kilometer (in contrast, 4G can support 100,000 devices per square kilometer). While only 3 percent of global cellular connections are currently via 5G, sub-Saharan Africa will still catch up for some time: Currently around half of the cellular connections in the region are still connected to 3G.
In related technology news, Apple launched its contactless payment service in South Africa on Tuesday. Three South African banks – Absa Group, Nedbank Group and Discovery Bank – will support the service. In particular, Apple Pay will be the second digital wallet in South Africa: Samsung introduced Samsung Pay there in 2018. While e-commerce and digital payments have already been on the rise in the country due to the COVID-19 pandemic, experts believe this is new offering will continue to expand the use of these tools.
For more information on efforts to close the digital divide in Africa, see Hafez Ghanem’s Foresight Africa 2020 Point of View.
Attacks in northern Mozambique disrupt economic activity
On Sunday, the Mozambique Army fought insurgent rebels near the strategic gas-rich city of Palma in northern Mozambique for the fifth day in a row. The conflict spans a three-year riot in Mozambique’s northernmost province, Cabo Delgado, which, according to Humans Right Watch, displaced 670,000 people and killed more than 2,600. According to the Associated Press, most rebels are disaffected young Muslim men, and foreign policy attributes the rise of these insurgents in Mozambique to the “marginalization of the Muslim-majority population.” The insurgents’ attacks have become more deadly and frequent since 2020: in fact, in August last year, rebels captured a port city 50 kilometers south of Palma. Despite the Islamic State assuming responsibility for the latest attack, Reuters has not been able to independently verify its claims.
In particular, the attacks also threaten the $ 20 billion liquefied natural gas project near the city operated by French oil giant Total. Work on the gas project, one of the largest private investments in Africa according to Bloomberg, had to stop in January due to similar attacks by the insurgents. Work only resumed last week before new attacks forced Total to evacuate its workforce.
