Bertrand Badie, an expert in international relations and emeritus professor at the prestigious Sciences Po school in Paris, analyzes the Niger crisis for La Vanguardia, which he considers a major setback for France and "a humiliation" for President Emmanuel Macron. Badie sees a key role for the United States, the privileged interlocutor of the coup leaders.
What have France and the West done wrong to make what is happening in the Sahel happen?
If I had to summarize, I would say that France, since the independence of the African states, has carried out a schoolteacher diplomacy, based on the temptation to give lessons and distribute punishment. This method worked quite well at the beginning because there was only a small political elite that was sensitive to this patronage link. France has probably not understood that African societies have been transformed, that it is the youngest continent, with a renewed generation and an involvement of society in the political game that tolerates less and less that schoolteacher diplomacy, that mixture of lessons and punishment.
What else has gone wrong?
France has not seen this wind of mistrust in African public opinion and this desire for change grow, at least for ten years. When we look at the statistics, like in Niger, we see that the economic and social situation is not good. African society has verified that the political system was not effective at all, it did not offer economic or social progress, that there was still very strong corruption and a facade democracy. Little by little these political systems have seen their legitimacy challenged. Later, due to international propaganda, especially from Russia and Wagner, this challenge to the political system has become a challenge to France and the former colonial powers. I would say more towards France than towards the West, because what is interesting in Niger is the activism of the United States. The military junta has sought out the United States, appointing a prime minister and a chief of staff who are very close to the Americans. It is not, then, so much an anti-Western dispute as an anti-French dispute or, rather, anti-French government.
Will the Americans be able to solve the crisis?
General Tiani's skill has been to address the United States. Since he carried out the coup, he has done nothing more than give gifts to the US, appointing Lamine Zeine as Prime Minister and US-trained General Barmou as Chief of Staff, and establishing links with Blinken and Undersecretary of State. There is the will to a rather clever game of pitting the United States against France to consolidate its own power, the coup and then a transitional regime.
What ties does the prime minister have with Washington?
The United States knows him and offers him guarantees because he is an economist who, although trained in France, has a neoliberal ideology and played a very relevant role in the African Development Bank (ADB). Those are very acceptable credentials for the United States. It is not the same as having appointed an obscure general.
Is the Sahel like a second front of the war in Ukraine?
You are right to say that. Not enough is said. I believe that international relations form a unique system. Yes, there is a Ukrainian echo in this Nigerian crisis, first because, clearly, the obsession of the United States and also of France, the EU and ECOWAS itself (Economic Community of West African States) is to contain Russian influence in Africa. Putin's game, as we recently saw in Saint Petersburg (Russia-Africa summit), consists of aligning the maximum number of African states to his cause. Of the 16 former French colonies in Africa, 9 have refused to sanction Russia or vote against it at the UN. From a certain point of view, the events in Niger are the triumph of the Global South. One realizes that, more and more, the Global South is the arbiter in this conflict and each party (Russia and the West) wants to have the best possible position in this arbitration. That is why the United States has rushed to manage the Niger crisis and its objective, contrary to France, is not to eliminate the coup but to make what comes out of it more favorable to the United States than to Russia.
Macron is very quiet, on vacation in Fort de Brégançon. It is not surprising?
Attention, at first he said a lot. Macron's big mistake was his immediate reaction, too energetic, condemning the coup, and almost calling for the elimination of the coup plotters and the reinstatement of his friend, President Bazoum. But he soon realized that it was more complicated than he thought. Macron's big mistake is always reacting immediately. He thought Cedeao was going to do the job. That is knowing Africa wrong. The member states are very divided and their public opinions are against a military intervention. Macron realized that he was at an impasse. Faced with this, he had two alternatives: back off, which in the eyes of the entire world is humiliating, or put himself in a corner and wait. It is what he has done. For Macron, the Niger issue is a terrifying drama. He loses his best support in Africa, appears incapable of doing anything, is forced to give the United States the lead, which is a very important humiliation in the African context, and shows that he has made a mistake in the calculations of he.
Is failure in the Sahel the equivalent for France of US failure in Afghanistan?
Yes and no. Yes, because it shows once again that foreign military interventions do not work. It has already happened in Iraq, Afghanistan, Somalia, Yemen. It is a universal phenomenon. The big difference is that there was no prior contention or even prior history between the United States and Afghanistan before the 2001 intervention. Niger is much more complicated. It is a former French colony. France fails to rid itself of all its colonial history. If you compare it with other former colonial powers, such as Great Britain or Portugal, which was the last colonizer in Africa, these are countries that have been able to turn the page. The great drama of France is that it does not know how to turn the page, it is France's inability to redefine itself.
What is the most dangerous of the current moment, the impulse to jihadism or the uncontrolled migration through Niger?
One thing or another. Let's be modern, migration is an irreversible parameter of globalization. Linking the Nigerian question to the migratory flow is to scare public opinion to prevent it from evolving on its analyzes of Africa. Regarding jihadism, of course it is a problem, because of the violence it generates, but jihadism takes advantage of the disastrous situation in Africa on the social and economic level. Jihadism is an epiphenomenon of a society that cannot get out of its development problem and above all that does not manage to obtain that recognition, that right to be a full-fledged actor in international relations. The jihadists only take advantage of the failures of Africa.
