A tale about exploitation and manipulation

“He is a lover of his country who rebukes and does not excuse its sins. It isrighteousness that exalteth a nation while sin is a reproach to any people.”

Frederick Douglass, US abolitionist and statesman, ‘Love of God, Love of Man, Love of Country’, speech in Syracuse, New York State, 1847.

Ray Finch MEP Member of the EFDD Group in the European Parliament

and Dirk Crols

ISBN xxx xxxxxx xxxxx

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ContentsMap: EU economic influence in Africa ... ... ... ... 4

Glossary ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... 5

Foreword ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... 6

Introduction:

How hidden colonialism brings back the evils of the past ... ... 8

Part One: A repeated history of exploitation

Africa’s first exploited resource: slavery ... ... ... 12

Map: The Scramble for Africa, 1878-1913 ... ... ... ... 16

Hiding profit, plunder, and prestige in plain sight ... ... ... 17

A licence to exploit ... ... ... ... ... ... 22

The legacy of empire: a poisoned chalice ... ... ... ... 23

EurAfrica: the imperialist intentions of the EU’s founders ... ... 27

An unholy alliance: the Yaoundé Convention ... ... ... 31

Old wine in new bottles: the Lomé Convention ... ... ... 37

Les liaisons dangereuses: French neocolonialism in West Africa ... 41

The cannibal ... ... ... ... ... ... ... 44

Part Two: The control of agriculture and fisheries

Feeding the beast: how EU agricultural subsidies are undermining Africa’s agriculture 46

The winner takes it all: the exploitative system of the EU’s fisheries agreements ... ... 52

Crime pays ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... 58

Much ado about nothing ... ... ... ... ... ... 62

Part Three: The control of Africa’s market, trade and land

A market grab: the Economic Partnership Agreements ... ... 65

He who pays the piper calls the tune: aid as a lever ... ... 70

The road to poverty: the Ugandan experience ... ... ... 72

Stick and carrot: the imposition of the Economic the imposition of the Economic Partnership Agreements ... ... 74

Followers and dissidents ... ... ... ... ... ... 76

The new colonial trap: the paradox of Belgian chocolate and German coffee ... ... 80

The chocolate box: the sweet poison ... ... ... ... 85

Dirty energy: the EU’s energy policy and land grabbing ... ... 86

A game of shadows: the European Investment Bank and the quest for raw materials ... ... ... ... ... 90

Part Four: An inconvenient truth

The curse ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... 94

All the Presidents’ men (and women) ... ... ... ... 97

A glorious revolution? The false hope of socialism ... ... ... 100

It’s the institutions, stupid! ... ... ... ... ... ... 104

Part Five: Conclusion ~The road to freedom and democracy

How and why the EU intends to shackle Britain like it shackles Africa 106

How to break the mould of repeated exploitation ... ... ... 110

Notes ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... 114

Bibliography ... ... ... ... ... ... ... 123

Acknowledgements ... ... ... ... ... ... 127

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Subject to active EUFishing Agreements

Non-active EUFishing Agreements

Also mentionedin this booklet

Cameroon

Niger

MauritaniaMali

Senegal

Guinea-Bissau

Guinea

Sierra LeoneLiberia

Ghana

Togo Benin

Chad

BurkinaFaso

Nigeria

Central AfricanRepublic

Sudan

SouthSudan

Egypt

Ethiopia Somalia

Uganda Kenya

Tanzania

Eritrea

WesternSahara

Morocco

Algeria

Tunisia

Libya

DemocraticRepublic of the Congo

RwandaBurundi

Angola

Zambia

Madagascar

Seychelles

Zimbabwe

Botswana

South Africa

LesothoSwaziland

Malawi

Namibia

(Angola)

Republicof theCongo

GabonEquatorial Guineau

Cape Verde

Sao Tome & Principe

Gambia

Mozambique

Comoro Is.

Mauritius

Ivory Coast

“It is not possible to found a lasting power upon injustice, perjury,and treachery. These may, perhaps, succeed for once, and borrow for awhile, from hope, a gay and flourishing appearance. But time betrays

their weakness, and they fall into ruin of themselves.”

Demosthenes. Athenian statesman, 4th century BC.

EU Economic Influence in Africa

ACP African, Caribbean and PacificStates

CAP Common Agricultural PolicyCFP Common Fisheries PolicyDG Directorate General DRC Democratic Republic of CongoECA European Court of AuditorsEEZ Exclusive Economic Zone - sea

zone prescribed by the UNConvention on the ‘Law of theSea’ over which a state hasspecial rights regarding marineresources

EDF European Development FundEEC European Economic

CommunityEPA Economic Partnership

Agreement EIB European Investment BankEJF Environmental Justice

FoundationFA Fishing AgreementGDP Gross Domestic Product - the

total value of goods producedand services provided in acountry during one year

GNI Gross National IncomeGSP General System of PreferencesIF Investment Facility - main

instrument for EU loans toAfrica and the Caribbean

IMF International Monetary FundISS Institute for Security StudiesKNB Kampala Northern Bypass,

UgandaMCM Mopani Copper Mines, ZambiaMtoe Million tonnes oil equivalent

NAC National Africa Company - The renamed British UACin1886. It excluded all othertrading firms in the NigerDelta.

NIEO New International EconomicOrder

NGO Non-governmental organisationODI Overseas Development InstituteRED EU Renewable Energy DirectiveRCC Reynold Construction CompanyRNC Royal Niger Company - a

merger of British companies inthe Niger Delta in 1879

ROO Rules of originSAP Structural Adjustment

Programme - instituted by theWorld Bank and IMF

SFPA Sustainable Fishing PartnershipAgreement

SPS Product standards and sanitaryphytosanitary measures

STABEX Système de Stabilisation desRecettes d’Exportation -introduced under the LoméConvention in 1975

TAC Total Allowable Catch (of fish)TNC Transnational CorporationUAC United Africa Company - The

renamed British RNC in 1882UNCLOS United Nations Convention on

the Law of the SeaUNECA United Nations Commission for

AfricaUNRA Uganda National Roads

AuthorityWTO World Trade Organisation

Glossary

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The history of Africa is one of exploitation,

and this exploitation has generally been the strong,

industrialised countries taking advantage of those

too weak to defend themselves.

This exploitation started with explorers and adventurers

arriving from Europe, but once the wealth of the African

continent was realised, our natural resources, including people,

were quickly plundered on an industrial scale.

We continue to see the economic

and political progress of African states stymied by corporate

interests, and the raw materials that would build African

economies transported to industrialised countries, resulting in

Africa becoming ever more dependent on those who would

exploit for their own gains.

I hope and trust this publication will stimulate

debate and discussion on the continuing policies of

colonialism that bedevil Africa’s future.

~

President Muse Bihi Abdi,

5th President of Somaliland

Foreword

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How hidden colonialism brings back

the evils of the past“We are a very special construction, unique in the history of mankind.Sometimes I like to compare the EU as a creation to the organisation ofempire. We have the dimension of empire. (...) What we have is the firstnon-imperial empire. We have 27 countries that fully decided to work

together and to pool their sovereignty. I believe it is a great construction andwe should be proud of it” 1

José Manuel Barroso, former President of the European Commission (2004-2014)

“Sovereignty is about the ability of a nation-state (comprised of its citizensand political leadership) to genuinely exercise policy control over its futuredirection based upon indigenous needs and expectations. Sovereignty itself isforfeited when foreign powers are able to co-opt or coerce internal politicalelites to the extent that domestic policies serve external interests rather than

the national interest”2

Mark Langan, Senior Lecturer in International Politics, University of Newcastle

INTRODUCTION

This is a story about the exploitation of the territories of Sub-Saharan Africa through the policies and actions of the

economic and political powers in Europe, both present and past.There is a common thread running through all the parts of thenarrative, and that thread is the interests of both Big Business inEurope and predatory leaders in Africa, seeking profit and plunder.Actors, systems and policies have changed over time, but theunderlying theme has remained constant.

Our story begins with the period of the Atlantic slave trade, starting in the17th century.

Under the approving eye of their respective governments, big Europeantrading companies and (slave) merchants negotiated slave deals with localAfrican rulers. Millions of Africans were forced onto slave ships andtransported across the Atlantic Ocean to the Americas. Those who survivedwere forced to work under very hard conditions on the newly establishedplantations.

The slave trade fuelled economic growth in Europe. It was, for example, oneof the richest parts of Britain’s trade in the 18th century. The profits gainedfrom slavery helped to finance the Industrial Revolution; the Caribbeanislands became the hub of British, Dutch andFrench Empires.

But the period of the slave trade wasfollowed in Africa by an era of Europeancolonialism. Though the nineteenth centurypartition of Africa was dressed up in termsof development, the main objective of theEuropean colonial powers was to exploitAfrica’s natural resources. Essentially,European powers used Africa both as asource of raw material and as a market for selling Western Europeanmanufacture. Territorial boundaries were drawn and entities created toserve the interests of the European Great Powers. The African colonieswere forced to specialise in primary products and existed as suppliers ofraw materials to feed Europe’s industry.

Naturally, the roads, railways, electric power systems and administrativestructures that were built in the African territories mainly served to facilitatethe extraction of natural resources. At the same time, the colonial powersobstructed the development of a local industry to continue the dependenceof African colonies on manufactured products. By 1900, this unequal divisionof trade and labour had firmly been established.

In the twentieth century, the continuous exploitation of Africa was also a

African countriesdeliver the resourcesbut do not receivethe value of these

resources.

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central part of the project of the pioneers and architects of Europeanintegration. A collective European exploitation of Africa would, in their view,foster European integration and sustain the position of the old continent inworld politics.

The trade and development relationship between the early EuropeanEconomic Community (EEC) with African countries was a copy of the lateFrench colonial trade system. It was designed to retain African countries assuppliers of raw materials, thereby perpetuating the colonial economicsystem with its unequal division of labour.

The political and economic elites in Europe have created and designed theEEC, later transformed into the EU 3, as a corporatist organisation. The EU’spolicies have always been aimed at protecting and promoting the interestsof corporate entities in various fields, ranging from agriculture to fisheriesand mining. The EU’s policies towards Sub-Saharan Africa have facilitated acontinuous pattern of exploitation, imposing unequal internationalagreements, and using punitive tariffs and harmful subsidies. Essentially, theEU has continued the policy of exploitation by the former European GreatPowers, thereby acting as an empire and obstructing development in Africa.

History is repeating itself. Also in the postcolonial era, the African continentis primarily utilised as a source of raw material; again wealth is drawn fromAfrica and transferred to Europe. African countries are delivering theresources, but are not receiving the value of these resources. The profitsare being made by big companies in Europe and America. European fisheriesagreements (FAs) and Economic Partnership Agreements (EPAs) areessentially a tool of exploitation.

But this process of continuous exploitation of Sub-Saharan Africa has neverbeen a one-way street. African elites have never been passive victims offoreign manipulation. There has always been a dialectic between the eliteson both sides. Many African leaders depend on access to external resourceflows - from aid and trade - to stay in power. That is why they have alwaysactively courted European elites, seeking aid donations and tradearrangements. This interaction reinforced relations of dependency but alsoensured regime survival.

It is this unholy alliance which has enabled the EU to perpetuate the formercolonial policy of exploitation at the expense of the local population.

The European Council Guidelines for the future relationship between theEU and the United Kingdom (UK) mirror the kind of one-way imposition ofcultural values and foreign laws that characterise the EU’s relationship with,in particular, France’s former North African colonies and Francophone WestAfrica. Over many decades the EU has perfected ways in which to continuethe subjugation of Africa, and intends to use the same methods to keepBritain at its mercy.

Trade deals with the EU are not about trade, they are about control.Understanding what the EU has done to Africa informs us what the EU hasin store for the UK. In contrast, we propose that the UK should offer Africafree trade, nothing more and nothing less. Only a ‘no deal’ exit from the EUwill break the EU shackles that bind the UK’s trade policy, enabling the UKto offer African economies the freedoms it wishes for itself.

The British broke the African slave trade almost two hundred years ago. Itis now high time that Britain leads the way again. Brexit gives us theopportunity to challenge the EU’s exploitative policy towards Africa: whatAfrica needs is free trade, not ‘aid’.

High Street contrast - London and Lagos - massive wealth has accumulated to EuropeanUnion countries at the expense of African nations that are exploited to generate resources

with little real benefit to their own economies.

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Africa’s first exploitedresource: slavery

“In Europe it is the extension of commerce, the maintenance of nationalhonour, or some great public object, that is ever the motive to war with everymonarch; but, in Africa, it is the personal avarice and sensuality of theirkings. These two vices of avarice and sensuality ... we tempt, we stimulatein all these African princes, and we depend upon these vices for the very

maintenance of the slave trade ...” 4

William Wilberforce, British politician and philanthropist, 12 May 1789

“What a glorious and advantageous trade this is ... It is the hinge on which all trade of this globe moves” 5

James Houston, employee of a firm of 18th century slave merchants

PART ONE - A REPEATED HISTORY OF EXPLOITATION

The African slave trade was not a European invention. It hadalready been a well-established practice, centuries before the

Europeans arrived in Africa, dating back to the 7th century 6. Thetrans-Saharan slave trade, controlled by Arab traders, moved anestimated 10 million slaves, taken from East and West Africa boundfor North Africa, the Middle East and India.

The European involvement with the slave trade in Africa started a thousandyears later, in the 17th century.

The expansion of European colonial powers to the Americas led to a massivedemand for cheap labour needed to cultivate the crops of the newlyconquered lands. The production of tobacco, sugar, cane and cotton wasvery labour-intensive. Because of the dramatic fall in the indigenous labourforce, the Europeans sailed to African shores offering cloth, metals, tools,

knives and other hardware, guns and ammunition, and wine and rum toAfrican rulers in exchange for slaves.

Thus, the Atlantic slave trade was economically motivated. The export ofAfrican slaves from the coasts of Africa to the Americas was for the solepurpose of profit on the part of European and African elites.

European slave merchants used firearms and alcohol as a bait. It was aprofitable trade for both sides. The European merchants also needed to buylarge quantities of provisions to feed the slaves during the Atlantic crossing.

African slaves had serviced the Islamic empires of the Middle East since the eighth centuryAD. From the 1700’s, the emergent European powers got in on the act.

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African rulers were playedagainst each other byEuropean companies likethe French Company ofthe West Indies, theBritish Royal AfricanCompany and the DutchWest India Company. Insuccessions of power,companies supported thecandidates whom theylater used as allies for theslave trade.

In the 17th century, about 1,350,000 Africans were sold as slaves in theAtlantic slave trade. This trade peaked in the 18th century during the earlypart of which about 6,000,000 slaves were shipped across the Atlantic 7.

In the 1780s, on average some 78,000 slaves were brought to the Americaseach year. About half these slaves were transported in British merchantships. Their nearest competitors, the French and Portuguese traders, carriedeach about a fifth of the total. But the British blockade of continental Europeduring the Revolutionary and Napoleonic wars at the turn of the centuryvirtually ended the French, Dutch and Danish trades, leaving 60 per cent ofthe slave trade in British hands 8.

The slave trade was big business and generated vast profits and income fordifferent categories of economic sectors and actors.

In the first place, slave ship owners, slave traders, plantation owners andAfrican leaders profited from it.

Factory owners in Britain also grew rich from this trade. For example,textiles from Yorkshire and Lancashire were sold to slave-captains to barterwith. Many of the textiles produced in Manchester were exported to Africa.In addition, industrial plants were built to refine the imported raw sugar andglassware was needed to bottle the rum. These factories provided manyjobs for ordinary people.

The ports of Bristol and Liverpool became major ports through fitting outslave ships and handling the cargoes they brought back.

Last but not least, banks and finance houses made huge profits from the feesand interest they earned from merchants who borrowed money for theirlong voyages.

Slavery across the British Empire was abolished in 1833 by an Act of theBritish Parliament, freeing more than 800,000 enslaved Africans in theCaribbean and South Africa as well as a small number in Canada 9. However,slavery remained a way of life in Africa and the United States. Africans wereput to work under coercion, to produce and export tropical products suchas palm oil and kernel, peanuts, ivory and rubber.

Sugar-cane production in the West Indies was originally carried out by Irish prisoners of the post Civil War period in the mid-17th century. As the demand for labour increased, these prisoners were supplemented by imported African slaves.

78,000PER YEAR

Leeds 30,609

Birmingham 42,250

Manchester 42,821

Leeds 30,609

Birmingham 42,250

Manchester 42,821

Populations of English cities, c1780

Slaves transported across Atlantic, 1780’s

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Belgium

Germany

Spain

France

Britain

Italy

Portugal

Independent

Colonies established by 1913

Mouth of the Zambezi

Map does not show frontiershifts between 1885 and 1913.German colonies were conquered or annexed by Britain, France and Belgium during WW1, 1914-1918.

Liberia

Ethiopia(Abyssinia)

International borders, 2018

Liberia was colonised and ruled by ex-slaves from America from 1847.

Ethiopia had lost its coastal areas to Europeans, and was attacked by Britain in 1868.

F R E N C H W E S T A F R I C AAnglo

EgyptianSudan

NigeriaGoldCoast

British East Africa

GermanEast Africa

BelgianCongo

FrenchCongo

PortugeseWest Africa Portugese

East Africa

GermanS.W.

Africa

Kamerun

N. Rhodesia

S. Rhodesia

Bechuanaland

Transvaal

Cape ofGood Hope

TripoliEgypt

FrenchUbangi

The Scramble for Africa: 1878-1913

“British explorer David Livingstone had described colonialism in theapparently benign terms of the ‘three Cs’: Commerce, Christianity, andCivilisation. The more malign ‘three Ps’ may, in fact, have been more

accurate: Profit, Plunder and Prestige” 10

Adekeye Adebajo, Professor and Director of the Institute for Pan-African Thought and Conversation at the University of Johannesburg

Hiding profit, plunder and prestige

in plain sight“To open up to civilisation the only part of our globe which it has

not yet penetrated, to pierce the darkness in which entire populations areenveloped is, I venture to say, a crusade worthy of this age of progress, and Iam happy to perceive how much the public feeling is in favour of its accom-

plishments; the tide is with us ... Need I say that, in bringing you toBrussels, I have not been influenced by selfish views. No gentlemen, if

Belgium is small, she is happy and contended with her lot. I have no otherambition than to serve her well” 11

Leopold II, King of Belgium (1865-1909), Opening speech at the InternationalGeographic Conference, Brussels, 1876

European expansion in Africa heated up in the 1880s, leading toan increased rivalry between European powers.

The main purpose of the 1884-85 Berlin Conference, organised by GermanChancellor Otto von Bismarck, was to manage the ongoing process ofcolonisation in order to avoid the outbreak of armed conflict between rivalcolonial powers. The European Great Powers also wanted an agreement onthe rights claimed by the Belgian king Leopold II for his Congo Association.

In Berlin the representatives of the major European countries, the UnitedStates, Russia and the Ottoman Empire concluded a European collectiveagreement, determining the future of the African continent without anyAfrican involvement. At the conclusion of the conference on 19 February1885, the ‘Lagos Observer’ noted: “The world has, perhaps, never witnesseduntil now such highhanded a robbery on so large a scale. Africa is helplessto prevent it ... It is on the cards that this ‘Christian’ business can only end,at no distant date, in the annihilation of the natives” 12.

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The General Act (GA) of the Berlin conference established a regime of freetrade in the ‘hydrographic’ basin of the Congo river, stretching across themiddle of Africa from the Atlantic to the Indian Ocean from 5° North to themouth of Zambezi in the South. The powers also bound themselves torespect the neutrality of the Congo basin. In addition, the GA stipulatedthat any power acquiring territory on the African coast had to notify allother powers of their claim.

As the ‘Scramble’ had already started before the Berlin Conference, themeeting as such did not partition the African continent. It provided a‘legitimating cover’, encouraging the European powers to accelerate theprocess of carving up the African continent 13.

In 1875, less than one tenth of Africa hadbeen annexed by European states, yet by1895 only one tenth remainedunappropriated. Between 1871 and 1900,Britain added 4 and a quarter a millionsquare miles and 66 million peoples to herempire, France added 3 and a half millionsquare miles and 26 million people.Germany acquired a new empire of 1million square miles and 13 million peopleand Belgium and Italy also gainedconsiderable territory in Africa 14.

The European powers claimed that their expansion would bring civilisationto Africa and enlighten its peoples who still “sat in darkness”. The GA statedthat the European colonisers had a duty to promote the “moral and materialwell-being of the native populations”15. Spreading civilisation had become akind of religion, and imperialism and colonialism were presented as a newcrusade.

This positive impression was widely held, expressed for example by RudyardKipling, British novelist and poet, in his poem ‘The White Man’s Burden’ 16.In this poem, Kipling urged the United States to assume colonial control ofthe Philippines and to take up the ‘burden’ of empire, following the Europeanexample. In Kipling’s view, the developed white peoples had a moral

obligation to rule the non-white peoples of theEarth, encouraging their economic, cultural, andsocial progress through colonialism. With theguidance of the Western states, the non-whiteprimitive peoples, incapable of self-government, could eventually becomecivilised (and Christianised).

Not everyone agreed. For example, USSenator Benjamin Tillman protested, asking: “Whyare we bent on forcing upon them a civilisation notsuited to them, and which only means, in their view,degradation and a loss of self-respect, which isworse than the loss of life itself?”17.

According to Theodore Roosevelt, soon tobecome Vice-president and then President ofthe United States of America, the poem was“rather poor poetry, but good sense from theexpansion point of view”18.

Whereas the British spoke of the White Man’sBurden, the French referred to their ‘mission civilisatrice’. Within many Frenchcircles, the idea of bringing civilisation was considered as “the triumph anddevelopment of reason, not only in the constitutional, political and administrativedomains, but in the moral, religious, and intellectual spheres [representing] theessence of French achievements compared to the uncivilised world of savages,slaves and barbarians” 19.

Spreading Christianity was an integral part of this civilisation project.Europeans denounced the traditional religious practices of Africans aswitchcraft and heathenism. Colonisation would encourage the conversionof the peoples of Africa to the Christian faith. Under the pretext ofspreading a just and compassionate religion, European powers imposed theirown society and culture.

The European Great Powers dressed up their expansion policy in moralterms, claiming African peoples would only benefit from it. It enabled those

In 1875, less thanone tenth of Africahad been annexedby European states,yet by 1895 onlyone tenth remainedunappropriated.

In Kipling’s view, the developed whitepeoples had a moralobligation to rule thenon-white peoples of the Earth

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who wanted to exploit African resources to hide behind it.

European trade companies and entrepreneurs, often funded by governments,were the primary drivers behind the European urge to expand. Attractedby the untapped wealth of natural resources, they pushed and lobbied theirgovernments to establish control over African territories that would serveas a source of raw materials and a market for European goods 20.

Toward the end of the nineteenth century, Europe found itself in anincreasing trade deficit as many of its major trade partners implementedprotectionist economic policies following the Long Depression (1873-1896).Africa promised an open market that would create a trade surplus forEuropean powers 21, and it would also provide industries in Europe withmassive quantities of raw materials (copper, cotton, rubber, palm oil, tin).After the American Civil War, Europe increasingly relied upon Africa and theEast for its cotton. At the same time, the rise of the average income of thepopulation led to a surge in the demand for all kinds of different materialgoods, many of which only tropical regions could supply.

In sum, bringing Africa within its orbit and gaining control over Africa’s naturalresources would enable Europe to continue to feed its complex industry,acquire greater economic wealth and fulfil its consumer needs 22.

European expansion was also driven by political motives. National prestigeplayed a very important role. Only when a country had acquired coloniesdid it truly become a Great Power. Having colonies was a normal criterionof greatness. Britain and France had had colonies for centuries. Therefore,the newly formed countries in the 1860s and 1870s - Germany and Italy -wanted to acquire colonies as well 23.

There was another political factor. In Europe the ruling elites wereconfronted with a growing industrial working class which they could nolonger ignore. Colonialism was a way to appease the workers. Imperialadventures were exciting and the workers could identify with the colonialvictories of their country. Some critical voices compared it with the breadand circuses in the old Rome 24.

Bringing civilisation to Africa as a justification for colonialism would todaybe seen as racist and so a new justification of colonial rule was put forward:

the (technocratic) economic and social development of poverty-strickenAfricans.

The beginning of the Second World War meant that Britain and Francedepended more than ever on their respective empires for food and rawmaterials.

Lord Hailey, administrator in British India, and Colonial Office adviser, arguedthat colonial rule was legitimate because of the technical ability of thecolonisers to achieve rapid development for the poor nations. In that way,the British Empire was presented as a benevolent autocrat for the colonialpeoples. Africans and other peoples were only seen as passive objects ofdevelopment efforts. According to Lord Hailey and others, the poor weremuch more in need of bread than of a right to vote.

William Easterly, American development economist, terms this technocraticapproach to development as authoritarian development. It enabled thecolonising powers to postpone any demands of the subjected peoples forpolitical rights 25.

Family prosperity: much of Europe’s wealth in the late 19th century sat upon thefoundation of cheap raw materials from Africa.

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Big trading companies were the drivers behind colonial expansion.Many of them sought to monopolise the African trading market. Withthe military help from their respective governments, they intimidatedAfrican rulers to comply with their demands.

Sir George Goldie persuaded the Britishcompanies in the Niger delta to merge andform the United Africa Company (UAC) in1879, renamed the National Africa Company(NAC) in 1882. After a relentless price waragainst French companies, NAC became thesole European trading firm in 1884. Thecompany established a monopoly, buying outall the smaller companies in the region. NACdictated the prices it paid for the productsof the local people and sold imports to them.To intimidate the local population, Goldieestablished a force of more than 200 menwith sophisticated heavy artillery andmachine guns, and also acquired twentygunboats. By 1886, Goldie had imposed 237‘treaties of protection’ on local chiefs.

Largely as a result of the NAC’s influence at the 1884-85 Berlin Conference,Britain was recognised as the de facto power in the Niger region.

In 1886, the company obtained a charter from the British government, givingit sovereign rights to levy customs duties, acquire and develop lands andexploit the mineral and agricultural resources of the area. The company wasrenamed the Royal Niger Company (RNC). RNC excluded all other tradingfirms from the Niger trade. It exploited its absolute monopoly to makeexcessive profits, and never fostered economic or social development in theregion. The slightest local dissent was crushed. By the late 1890s, growingprotest against the brutal actions of the company forced the Britishgovernment to revoke the company’s charter 26.

A LICENCE TO EXPLOIT

Africa enslaved

22

The Legacy of Empire:a poisoned chalice

“We have been engaged in drawing lines upon maps where no white man’sfoot ever trod; we have been giving away mountains and rivers and lakes toeach other, only hindered by the small impediment that we never knew

exactly where they were” 27

Lord Salisbury, former Conservative politician and British Prime Minister (1885-86, 1886-92, and 1895-1902)

Whilst the positive impact of Western civilisation’s influenceon Africa is largely taken for granted, it is fair to point out

that European colonial rule over Africa also had a negative legacy.

The borders of the different spheres of influence, protectorates, coloniesand free-trade areas in Africa, drawn by European politicians and officials,were arbitrary, reflecting the short-term strategic and economic interestsof the imperial powers. They cut across pre-existing ethnic groups, andpolitical, social or economic divisions. It was striking, for example, thatGerman South-West Africa (Namibia) was given a narrow tract of land (theCaprivi Strip) to its north-east. Germany’s foreign minister, Count vonCaprivi, had insisted that the German colony should have access to theZambezi River, in order to deploy a gunboat. The tiny state, The Gambia wasspecifically created to serve British interests. Britain had established a tradingpost at the mouth of the River Gambia. Despite French cajoling, the Britishgovernment refused to give it up. As a result, a micro-state was created,entirely engulfed by francophone Senegal (except for its short coastline) 28.

Because of the imperially imposed borders, ethnic groups were broken upand dispersed over many states. The Somali people, for example, werescattered among five sovereign states: British Somaliland, Italian Somaliland,French Somaliland, Ethiopia and Kenya.

When African countries became independent in the 1960s, the continent

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was completely ‘balkanised’. The newly established African states were veryethnically diverse and artificial, consisting of a mix of peoples with differentcultures, traditions, origin and language. For example, there are more than200 ethnic groups residing within the boundaries of Tanzania. Colonialgeographical fragmentation was much worse in Africa than in other coloniesacross the world. In most African countries a significant fraction (around40-45 per cent) of the population belongs to groups that have beenpartitioned by a national border 29.

Ethnic diversity is associated not only withinternal ethnic conflict but also with relativelylow schooling, political instability, underdevelopedfinancial systems, high government deficits andinsufficient infrastructure. According toProfessor Paul Collier, British developmenteconomist at Oxford University, polarised

societies are more prone to competitive rent seeking and less likely toachieve consensus on the production of public goods like infrastructure,education, and good policies 30. Because different tribal groups are notcooperating with each other, necessary economic policy changes areobstructed. The reason is that the first group to accept the changes maybear a disproportionate share of the cost. Each tribal group that is allocateda role in the power structure is likely to look after its own interests ratherthan those of the whole population of the country. For example, afterPresident Moi took over in Kenya in 1978, the road investment share of theKenyatta coalition home regions fell significantly while the share of the Moicoalition home regions rose significantly.

It is claimed that ethnic diversity alone accounts for about 28 per cent ofthe growth differential between the countries of Africa and East Asia 31.

Colonial rule had a serious impact in the economic area.

First, the arbitrary decisions resulted in many African countries beinglandlocked, putting these states at a significant disadvantage in terms of trade.The compromises between the European powers also led to the emergenceof very different entities, in terms of size, disposal of natural resources andeconomic potentialities. Some states were left without significant resources

from which to build up an economy. Niger, for example, has a shortage ofagricultural land and only a few mineral deposits.

Transport and communication infrastructure was specifically developed totransport the minerals and cash crops from the plantations, farms and minesto the ports, from where they were shipped to Europe. Few lines ofcommunication were built to foster internal trade or trade between thecolonies. As a result, many African states still trade more with overseasterritories than with their neighbours.

The primary aim of colonial rule was to control trade and extract naturalresources in Africa. African economies became exporters of primaryproducts (minerals, coffee, tea, cocoa, vegetable oil, groundnuts, cotton, sisaletc.) to fulfil the needs of the European cities.

European governments imposed the growth of cash crops in Africa, witheach colony specialising in a different crop. Most of the farmers in Sub-Saharan Africa were subsistence farmers. They traded by barter instead ofmoney. The colonisers imposed taxes on peasants to be paid in Europeancurrencies, forcing them to abandon their land and their way of subsistencefarming, pushing farmers into employment in mines, on commercialplantations or growing cash crops. African workmen were only paid lowwages. In many parts of Africa, forced labour was introduced32.

Ethnic groups were broken upand dispersedover many states

Echoes of war: these marchers commemorate the lost state of Biafra. The Igbo weresubsumed into south-eastern Nigeria when the British founded the colony in the nineteenthcentury and they were ruthlessly suppressed during the Nigerian Civil War of 1967-70.

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The EU and Africa

26

For example, British and other European manufacturers pressed theirgovernments to promote cotton production in certain African countries toreduce their lint procurement costs and enhance the growth of their textileand clothing industries. The minor existing industries were eithersystematically destroyed or thwarted through the reallocation of labour tothe imposed agricultural system 33.

This evolution destroyed many traditional forms of agriculture.Consequently, many African states became ‘monocrop’ economies. Sucheconomies are particularly vulnerable because they are dependent on theprice of the commodity concerned on the world market. Apart from this,mono-crop economies are very detrimental to the soil, as nutrients areconstantly being extracted, and never replenished. Rotation of crops wasnot always practised, leading to soil degradation 34.

European colonialism had another legacy. The authoritarian Africanpredatory states of the postcolonial period were the natural successors ofthe political and economic extractive institutions, established by theEuropean powers.

The governments of Europe did not foster political and/or economicdevelopment of their colonies. They only charged their colonialadministrators with maintaining order, balancing the budgets and overseeingthe extraction of raw materials for export. Colonial rule was never aboutproviding public services for the local population. European colonial officialswere not accountable to the local citizens; they only received instructionsfrom their governments and ministries in Europe and were only answerableto the latter. To maintain control, the colonial administrations relied on asmall indigenous elite. Initially, the colonisers charged traditional leaders -such as chiefs or monarchs - with raising taxes, supplying labour and ensuringthat laws and regulations were respected. In return, the colonial state backedtheir leadership and allowed chiefs to take for themselves a percentage ofthe tax revenue they raised or the fines they imposed. Chiefs were also ableto run their jurisdiction largely as they saw fit.

Later, a younger well-educated African elite began to emerge. This groupwould lead the nationalist movement and push for independence 35.

EurAfrica: theimperialist intentions of

the EU’s founders“According to the Eurafrican idea, European integration would

come about only through a coordinated exploitation of Africa, and Africacould be efficiently exploited only if European states combined their economic

and political capacities. In 1957, these two propositions interlocked,contributing to the establishment of the European Economic Community(EEC), which in leading political circles and major news media was

simultaneously perceived as the creation of Eurafrica” 36

Peo Hansen and Stefan Jonsson, respectively Professor and Associate Professor at LinköpingUniversity, Sweden

African indigenous elites became Africa’s new rulers but theircountries became independent and sovereign in name only.

Although the European political and economic powers had handedover formal power, they continued to exert control over Sub-Saharan Africa by way of newer methods in order to exploit thecontinent’s natural resources.

Europe’s continued dominance over Africa was in factjustified by and closely linked with the early projectof European integration itself, both before and afterthe Second World War. The process of Europeanintegration and the collective European exploitationof Africa were two sides of the same coin.

Count Richard Coudenhove-Kalergi is considered asone of the very early ideological fathers of the EU.That is also why he was the first to receive theCharlemagne Prize in 1950.

Ideological father: CountRichard Coudenhove-Kalergisaw the aquisition of resourcesfrom Africa as means of

retaining European interests.

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In 1923, Richard Coudenhove-Kalergi founded the Pan-European Movement.This organisation considered that a united Europe was not only desirablefor cultural reasons but also paramount for political reasons, that is to say,to avoid war. In addition, the movement put forward an economic argument:the access to raw materials.

Coudenhove-Kalergi pointed out that the United States and the SovietUnion were able to organise their economies on a continental scale, makingthem self-sufficient for raw materials and providing greater markets for thesale of their products. By contrast, Europe was politically divided andsuffered economically from numerous trade barriers. The count arguedthat Europe could only develop its full potential by collectively exploitingAfrica. In a 1929 publication, he stated that “Africa could provide Europe withraw material for its industry, nutrition for its population, land for its overpopulation,labour for its unemployed and market for its products” 37. According to

Coudenhove-Kalergi, the lucrative commonexploitation of Africa would be a sufficient reason forthe European countries to unite. If Europe wouldunite and incorporate Africa into a new geopoliticalbloc, it would become prosperous and stronger.Moreover, the common exploitation of Africa wouldautomatically improve the relations between theEuropean states 38.

After the Second World War, the African colonies wereincluded in the European integration project toreorganise Europe following the decline in influence ofBritain and France.

The first proposal for European integration, the so-called Third World Powerproposal, launched by Britain’s Foreign minister, Ernest Bevin, was imbuedwith the idea of Eurafrica. In particular, Bevin said that only by including theAfrican colonies and their vast natural resources into a new European bloc,would Western Europe stand equally with the United States and the SovietUnion. This new cooperation, Bevin wrote, “could have the US dependent onus and eating out of our hands in four or five years. [The] US is barren of essentialmaterial and in Africa we have them all” 39.

The idea of Eurafrica and imperial politicsmotivated most of the founders of the EuropeanEconomic Community (EEC).

The ‘Father of Europe’ himself, Jean Monnet, wasa keen Eurafricanist. He suggested that Francecould give Africa as a “dowry to Europe” 40.Belgium’s Foreign minister Paul-Henri Spaak,one of the most important advocates andarchitects of European integration, emphasisedthat by adding the African territories, the newmarket would include more than 200 millioninhabitants. Access to Africa’s raw materialswould enable Europe to sustain itself.

In particular the French government saw the EEC as a Eurafrican as much asa European scheme.

At the time of the foundation of the EEC 41, France still controlled a largecolonial empire. The French colonies in Africa were grouped together in aFranc Zone with a uniform economic and monetary system. France alsohad a common market with its overseas territories. The trade relationshipbetween France and its colonies was highly protective and preferential.French manufactured goods were exchanged for African raw materials.France was very dependent on different kinds of tropical products and rawmaterials from its African colonies. For example, Gabon provided the lion’sshare of France’s uranium and thorium supplies, both of which are usable asfuel in nuclear reactors.

France systematically offered and consistently paid above world marketprices for a range of tropical products. This surprix system led to aconsiderable expansion of cash crops in all the French colonies. Becauseproducers of these primary products received preferential prices, they hadlittle incentive to increase efficiency or look for alternative trade channels.The French industry became also less competitive on a global scale. With acertain and cemented sales market in Africa, French industry was not beingforced to increase efficiency at the same pace as her internationalcompetitors 42.

Presumption: EU founder Jean Monnet suggested that France would provide Africa as a“Dowry to Europe”:

Europe could only developits full

potential bycollectivelyexploitingAfrica

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As France was economically profoundly connected to its colonies, the Frenchgovernment insisted on EEC trade preference and aid to its colonies andoverseas territories as a condition for joining the EEC. In the negotiations,France sought the continuous supply of raw materials and the export of thesurplus production to a wider market. The French negotiators were alsodetermined to spread the costs of administering France’s colonies over theother EEC member states to avoid any extra costs on the French economyin the wake of growing European competition 43.

In general, France saw the creation of a Euro-African free trade area as ameans to maintain its hegemony in and over West Africa 44.

Repeating the ‘civilising’ mandate of the Berlin Conference, the EEC justifiedthe association of the overseas territories as a way of improving the socialand economic development of the African territories. The associationsystem, enacted in Part IV of the Treaty of Rome, was simply “a continuationof the “white man’s burden” in a new form” 45. Again, not a single African countrywas consulted when this new collective European agreement was agreed.

In the name of economic development, the EEC took over the burden ofcolonial trade and aid from France, copying the French colonial trademonopoly system. The EEC member states also agreed to contribute to themaintenance of the French colonies. Accordingly, they set up a EuropeanDevelopment Fund (EDF), with a budget of 581 million ECUs, to promoteeconomic and social development and finance investment. In exchange,France opened up its colonial market to the other EEC member states.

Energy resource today: much of the uranium and thorium for France’s nuclear reactors comes from the Sub-Saharan state of Gabon.

An unholy alliance: the Yaoundé Convention

“The essence of neo-colonialism is that the State which is subject to it is, in theory, independent and has all the outward trappings of internationalsovereignty. In reality its economic system and thus its political policy is

directed from outside...

In fact, the limited neo-colonialism of the French period is now being mergedin the collective neo-colonialism of the European Common Market whichenables other States, hitherto outside the French preserve, to profit by the

system. It also rationalises the division of Africa into economic zones basedupon Europe, by drawing in four other States. The Congo (Leopoldville),Burundi and Rwanda are, as previous Belgian colonies, tied to the Belgianeconomic system and Somalia through its previous association with Italy is

also brought in as an associated State of the Common Market...

The rulers of the neo-colonial states derive their authority to govern from thesupport which they obtain from their neo-colonial masters. They have

therefore little interest in developing education, strengthening the bargainingpower of their workers employed by expatriate firms, or indeed of taking anystep which would challenge the colonial pattern of commerce (which) is the

object of neo-colonialism to preserve” 46

Kwame Nkrumah, President of Ghana from 1960 until 1966

“Yaoundé II and its predecessors were unabashedly neo-colonial. There wasno pretence of equality - suppliants met masters... The EEC saw the

geopolitics of Eurafrica in terms of reductionist, virtually static comparativeadvantage - their primary products, our manufactured products, overseas

investors and expert personnel. At best - and in these rapid growth and somesecondary industry was achieved - the colonial mise en valeur strategy was

operated more efficiently and (on the EEC side) quasi collectively” 47

Professor Reginald Herbold Green, development economist; Institute of DevelopmentStudies at the University of Sussex (1975-2000); author of more than 500 professional

articles, papers, book chapters and books

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32

The process of decolonisation of the late 1950s and beginningof the 1960s led to the annulment of the ‘association chapter’

of the Treaty of Rome. However, this system was continued underthe Yaoundé Convention (1963) 48.

The Yaoundé Convention was in fact a copy of the 1961 agreement betweenFrance and the Ivory Coast (Côte d’Ivoire) and French late colonial tradepractice.

The power of Ivory Coast’s ruling elite was based on a plantation economyof cocoa and coffee. As the sharp reduction in commodity prices in 1955was a threat for the regime, the coalition of cocoa and coffee planters startedto negotiate price support with France. This would guarantee a minimumeconomic performance, and ensure the survival of the regime. Francecreated a price-stabilisation scheme (Caisse de stabilisation des prix) tosubsidise the main exports of Ivory Coast, protecting the country againstcommodity-price deflation. At the time of the foundation of the EEC in1957-1958, raw materials exported from Ivory Coast to France were pricedbetween 16 and 60 per cent higher than world-market prices, depending onthe product. 49

When commodity prices went down again in 1961, the same scenario wasrepeated. Ivory Coast’s local rulers requested France for a (temporary)trade system that would shield the production of local commodities fromworld-market prices. The deal was that France continued to preferentiallyimport Ivory Coast’s principal agricultural products - including cocoa, coffeeand bananas - via a quota and a guarantee of prices higher than world-marketprices. In return, Ivory Coast guaranteed the exclusive importation ofcertain industrial products from France, the importation of fixed proportionsof other products and to place a 35 per cent tariff on non-French imports.For example, Ivory Coast was required to import all of its wheat and flourfrom France, as well as at least 70 per cent of its wine and beverages, 70 percent of its printed cloth, 60 per cent of its milk, 50 per cent of its tractorsand air conditioners, 30 per cent of its household electrical equipment, andso on 50. In sum, France provided support for Ivory Coast’s productionsystem in exchange for a guaranteed market.

In this way, Ivory Coast’s rulers were able to continue a productive system

that was broadly uncompetitive in the world market, with an increasedmarket concentration in France. The world-market price of coffee, forexample, decreased by nearly 50 per cent between 1956 and 1962. At thesame time, Ivory Coast’s coffee-producing land and coffee productionincreased from, respectively 300,000 hectares and 85,000 tonnes in 1956, to500,000 hectares and 150,000 tons in 1962. In the crop year of 1962-1963,France paid for Ivorian coffee a price of more than 45 per cent higher thanworld-market prices 51.

The case of Ivory Coast is illustrative for other former French colonies inWest Africa. The same pattern was also repeated in countries whose mainexport crops were not cocoa and coffee. For example, France introduceda price-support scheme for Niger’s main export crops, groundnuts andcotton.

For African rulers, a similar trade and aid relationship with the EEC wasessential. They depended on a continuous access to external financial flows- from both aid and trade - to ensure their minimum economic performanceand preserve their system of patronage, the basis of their political power.

From the very beginning of independence, Africa’s ruling elites utilised state

POST-COLONIAL STATE DEPENDENCE

0

20

40

60

80

100Percentage of total imports to the

Ivory Coast that came from France in 1961

wheat & flour

wine & beverages

printed cloth milk

tractors & aircon

household electrical

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The EU and Africa

34

institutions and economic resources to establish and maintain corrupt client-patron networks. These networks formed the basis of their regime, andwere mainly based upon tribal affiliation.

Political legitimacy derived from the ability of the ruling elites to reward theloyalty of acolytes. Government bureaucracies were crowded with party

loyalists and, accordingly, governmentbudgets became burdened with thehuge costs of civil service salaries,allowances and presidential expenses.For example, Senegal’s budget for1964 showed that 47 per cent of thetotal was allocated for civil servicesalaries. In the Central AfricanRepublic and in Ivory Coast the figurewas 58 per cent. In 1962, the Frenchagronomist René Dumont noted thata deputy in Gabon was paid morethan a British Member of Parliamentand earned in six months as much asthe average peasant did in thirty-sixyears 52.

The EEC (directed by France), on the other hand, sought to securecontinuous access to the African countries’ raw materials and to maintainpolitical influence in Sub-Saharan Africa.

This merging of interests produced the trade system of the YaoundéConvention, which essentially extended the French colonial trade system tothe other EEC member states.

In securing price support and market preferences for their products, theassociated African countries accepted the principle of ‘reciprocity’ underwhich the Six gained a distinct advantage over other industrial states in theirmarkets. The reciprocal preferential system, installed by the YaoundéConvention, protected the African states’ raw materials in the EEC marketand the EEC industrial products in the market of the 18 associated countries.

For example, Ivory Coast was not allowed to place quantitative (orqualitative) restrictions on imports originating from the EEC and there wasa maximum transitional tariff of 0-30 per cent. Non-EEC products weresubjected to higher tariffs, a variety of quotas and a renewable yearly importlicence. In return, Ivory Coast enjoyed preferential treatment in the wholeCommon Market 53.

In sum, the Yaoundé Convention was designed tocontinue the former colonial pattern of trade, butthis time under an EEC banner. It perpetuatedan unequal international division of labour, withthe African associates exporting commoditiesand importing finished products. This wasdressed up in the language of development andcooperation. Treaty provisions such as ‘culturalprogress’, ‘economic diversification’, and‘industrialisation’ were a scam.

During the negotiations, the African countries had asked for the applicationof the rules of the Common Agricultural Policy (CAP) on African productssupplementing or competing with European products. They had also made

STATE PATRONAGE

Civil Service salaries shown as a percentage of 1964 budget

Monocrop: the Yaoundé Convention meant that huge percentages of coffee and cocoa beanswere fed into the Common Market

Treaty provisions such as ‘culturalprogress’, ‘economicdiversification’, and‘industrialisation’ were a scam.

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The EU and Africa

36

it clear that the EDF did not have sufficient resources and that there wasnot enough aid for productive investment. But their proposals were largelyignored. The African countries had no means of exerting pressure on theSix and were obliged to refuse or to accept the proposals made by the EEC.

Their concern proved to be well founded. From 1957 to 1975, only a thirdof EDF funds were successfully disbursed during the lifetime of the respectiveagreements. Secondly, reflecting the bilateral practices of former colonialdonor states, most of the EDF aid was given to infrastructural projects,

thereby practically excluding development ofthe industrial sector 54.

The EEC’s trade preferences and fundinginduced the associated African countries tocontinue to produce export products thatwere uncompetitive in the global market andthat could only survive in the EEC’s protectedCommon Market. Under the YaoundéConvention, the colonial division of labour

and the dependency of the West African countries on the EEC wasreinforced. For example, at the end of the Yaoundé Convention, almost 75per cent of the cocoa beans of Ivory Coast was sold in the common market,compared to a 40 per cent market concentration in 1960. This was the casefor all Yaoundé-associated countries.

Because of the presence of numerous French industries and professionalsin Ivory Coast, French industrial products continued to dominate the Ivorianmarket. In the period from independence to the end of the YaoundéConvention, the number of French industries and professionals more thandoubled. Meanwhile, the other EEC countries also increased their sales ofequipment through EEC aid related imports 55.

In the Ivory Coast... the number of

French industries andprofessionals morethan doubled.

Old wine in new bottles:the Lomé Convention“ ... For the Lomé Agreement is not a progressive document which

constitutes an inching towards a more balanced and beneficial interdependentrelationship between Europe and Africa; rather it is a shift in the nature ofimperialism. Hence, despite the variety of EEC assistance ... the newrelationship between Europe and Africa has greatly reinforced the latter’scollective dependence on the former through trade relations, industrial co-

operation, economic development through EEC-financed aid, andconsultation through a range of institutions” 56

Professor Samuel Nana K.B. Asante, Paramount Chief of Asokore Asante in the Ashanti region, and international arbitrator.

The entry of the United Kingdom into the EEC in 1973 led to awidening of the EEC-African relationship to Britain’s former

colonies.

The Lomé Convention (1975) 57 replaced the ASSM(African states, Madagascar and Mauritius) entitywith a new configuration: the African, Caribbean andPacific states - the ACP. This new ACP groupingcomprised the original 18 Yaoundé states andMauritius, six other African states, and 21 less-developed Commonwealth countries. Of theseCommonwealth states, 12 were African, six fromthe Caribbean and three from the Pacific.

The negotiations of the first Lomé Convention haveto be seen within the context of the oil crisis of 1973-1974 and the growingconfidence of commodity exporters, claiming a New International EconomicOrder. While the primary aim of the EEC was to secure raw material, Africa’sleaders saw an opportunity to obtain price and market advantages thatwould bolster their power bases. The result of this interaction was that the

Africa’s leaders saw an opportunityto obtain price andmarket advantagesthat would bolstertheir power bases

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38

price and market advantages of the Yaoundé Convention were extended andin some cases expanded.

The Lomé Convention introduced non-reciprocal trade access, whichallowed approximately 99 per cent of ACP exports to enter the EEC’smarkets duty free. In addition, a new system of price support for agriculturalcommodities, STABEX (from the French Systéme de Stabilisation des Recettesd’Exportation) was introduced. The EEC provided funds to an ACP memberstate if that country experienced anything below a 7.5 per cent (later scaleddown to 6 per cent) loss in earnings from a listed product. Lomé IIintroduced SYSMIN, a compensatory financing scheme for minerals.

The 99 per cent customs-free access for ACP exports was, however, amisleading figure. The trade preferences of the Lomé Convention did notapply to the specific agricultural products of the CAP. The Convention’srules of origin meant that finished products in the industrial, agricultural andcommercial sectors were also excluded. This induced ACP states tocontinue to concentrate on raw material production. Lastly, the figurereferred to existing products, not to potential future exports.

Moreover, the trade preferences and favourable quotas of the LoméConvention were diluted by their later extension to non-ACP countries. Itis estimated that approximately 70 per cent of ACP exports could enterEurope duty-free under the EEC’s Generalised System of Preferences (GSP)anyhow58. Furthermore, many trade advantages remained dead letterbecause of the lack of ACP production capacity, or due to EEC non-tariffbarriers, including quality restrictions.

STABEX was a crucial instrument of the EEC to keepACP states in their role of producers and suppliers ofraw materials and importers of EEC manufacturedgoods. STABEX only covered agricultural products andexcluded manufactured and semi-manufacturedproducts. The EEC was not interested in stabilising ACPexport earnings in general; it only aimed at stabilisingand securing the quantities of certain raw materialimports that it needed. SYSMIN also did not operateas an earnings stabiliser, but rather as an aid systemgeared towards mineral production and export to EECmineral consumers 59.

Instead of flowing to the ostensible beneficiaries ineconomic sectors, STABEX resources were routinelyutilised as funds for elite patronage networks 60.

By 1980, STABEX resources covered only 53 per cent of the requests, by1981, it was able to fulfil only 24.7 per cent of the requests, and by 1984, itcovered just over 10 per cent61. As the disbursements of funds were at thediscretion of the EEC, there was no guarantee of disbursement.

The decision-making process in the EDF also illustrated that only theperception had changed, not the balance of power. The ACP states only hadlimited influence. An EDF Committee, of which only EEC representativeswere members, had the final say about the financing of individual projects 62.

The trade preferences and the price protection system of the LoméConvention had a perverse effect. The incentives of the trade system ledto resource misallocation, inducing the ruling elites in Africa to specialise in

Continuing dependence: even today, there are repercussions of the Lomé Convention - Malawi depends heavily on a monocrop economy, in sugar exports

The EEConly aimed atstabilising andsecuring thequantities ofcertain rawmaterials itneeded

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40

sectors such as sugar, cocoa, pineapple and banana. As the countriesconcerned had no production advantages in these products, this resourcemisallocation had negative economic and financial consequences.

Illustrative is the history of sugar production in Ivory Coast. The generoussugar arrangements included in the Lomé Convention prompted the rulingelites to start a massive sugar investment program. Public investment in theproduction of sugar was dramatically increased and new sugar complexeswere constructed. However, at the same time, the EEC also started to

increase European sugar production by way ofsubsidies. By 1981, the EEC had become theworld’s second largest exporter of sugar and itsdumping of sugar into the world market depressedworld sugar prices. This did not hinder the EEC tocontinue to increase the prices paid to Ivory Coastand other ACP sugar producers. As a result, thepolitical elites in these countries continued toincrease their local sugar capacity. In 1980, the unitoperating costs of production in Ivory Coast’s sixsugar factories were two or three times greaterthan world-market prices. The debt crisis that hitthe country from the beginning of 1980 was largelythe result of the EEC’s trade system which had ledto a misallocation of resources to sugar. Thecountry’s ruling elites had not based their decision

on normal economic calculations but on a colonial incentive structure. TheEEC trade system determined the specialisation of target societies,regardless of domestic factors 63.

The Lomé Convention had a similar effect on other African countries invarious sectors.

It is revealing that during the Lomé timeframe, the ACP countries’ shares inthe EEC’s market fell from 6.7 per cent in 1976 to 3 per cent in 1998, whilst60 per cent of the total ACP export concentrated on only 10 products 64.Poverty rose considerably in many ACP countries.

By 1981, the EEC had becomethe world’s secondlargest exporter ofsugar and its

dumping of sugarinto the worldmarket depressedworld sugar prices.

Les liaisons dangereuses: French neo-colonialism

in West Africa“Elf is not only an oil company, it is a parallel diplomacy,

aimed at keeping control over several African states, especially at the keymoment of decolonisation (...) Elf is also an extension of the French state,

thereby ensuring that African policy serves the interests of the country. It is fair to say that the president of Elf is at the same time president of anoil company and a second minister of cooperation. And it is precisely because

this corporation had a political and diplomatic objective in Africa, that it financed the secret service” 65

Loïk Le Foch-Prigent, former director of Elf Aquitaine, a French oil company

“Without Africa, France will have no history in the 21st century”

François Mitterrand, President of France from 1981 until 1995

“Without Africa, France will slide down into the rank of a third (world) power” 66

Jacques Chirac, Prime Minister (1974-1976, 1986-1988) and President of France from 1995 until 2007

France managed to expand its former colonial trade system toa wider European ambit. Because of its traditional leading

position in the EU, France strongly influenced the EU’s policytowards Sub-Saharan Africa during decades. For example, from1958 until 1985 the European Commissioner for Development wasconstantly a French national. Many of the civil servants at theCommission responsible for development and association havealso been French citizens.

At the same time, France continued to pursue a bilateral policy, aimed atkeeping its former colonies within its political and economic sphere ofinterest.

43

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42

Following the independence of Algeria in 1962, French President Charles DeGaulle decided to focus France’s attention on its former colonial empire inSub-Saharan Africa. Continued access of the French multinationals to theraw materials of these resource-rich countries and a continued political andmilitary presence on the African continent would enable France to keep itsindependence in energy matters and its status as a world power 67.

De Gaulle entrusted Jacques Foccart with the task oforchestrating an arrangement whereby France would maintainthe upper hand in its former colonies. Foccart set up a specialentirely independent organisation within the Frenchpresidential palace (Elysée) and elaborated a system ofpersonal relations and economic, political and militarymechanisms to preserve France’s dominant position in Africa.Foccart master-minded French action in Africa and createdhis own intelligence network on this continent. Heorchestrated coup d’Etats, military interventions, secretactivities and conspiracies, stabilising and destabilisingcountries. In exchange for bribes and political support, Africanleaders of the countries in the French sphere of interestallowed French garrisons on their territory and grantedexclusive rights to French corporations to exploit naturalresources. They acted more as agents of French business andgeopolitical interests than as independent leaders. Gabon,

also named ‘Foccartland’, was organised as the main pillar of this policy 68.

After the death of French President Pompidou in 1974, Foccart transferredhis network to the state-owned oil giant Elf. Elf became the main pillar ofFoccart’s system, also termed as Françafrique69. This policy was continuedunder the consecutive presidencies of Valéry Giscard d’Estaing (1974-1981),François Mitterrand (1981-1995), Jacques Chirac (1995-2007) and NicolasSarkozy (2007-2012) 70.

In November 2003, three key former executives of the state-owned oil giantwere jailed up to five years over corrupt practices in Africa and in France.The company’s ‘Mr Africa’, André Tarallo, had told the court that annual cashtransfers totalling about £10 million were made to Omar Bongo, Gabon’s

president, while other huge sums were paid to leaders in Angola, Cameroonand Congo-Brazzaville. These payments were partly aimed at guaranteeingthat it was Elf and not American or British firms that pumped the oil, butalso to ensure the African leaders’ allegiance to France. In Gabon, Elf was averitable state within a state. France accounted for three-quarters of foreigninvestment in Gabon, and Gabon sometimes provided 75 per cent of Elf ’sprofits. In exchange for the bribes paid by Elf, France used Gabon as a basefor military and espionage activities in West Africa 71.

Elf Aquitaine merged with TotalFina to form TotalFinaElf. The new companychanged its name to Total in 2003.

Total has continued to dominate the economic landscape in many formerFrench colonies and has maintained a strong influence. It is, for example,reported that the government of the Republic of Congo, also known asCongo-Brazzaville, asked the company to help with paying the salaries ofofficials working for the president and the ministries 72.

France ...aimed atkeeping itsformercolonieswithin itspolitical andeconomicsphere ofinterest

Niger(2017)

Mauritania(current)

Mali2012-2014

SenegalChad

(1986-2013)Burkina

Faso

C.A.R. (7 times,1960-2013)

Algeria

Libya (2011)

DemocraticRepublic of the Congo(current)

Gabon

Ivory Coast(2014-2015)

French military operations

French supporting operations

French deployments and bases

Djibouti(1999-2001)

“We can’t be, and don’t want to be, the

Praetorian (guards) of sovereign African

countries.”French Defence

Minister, FlorenceParly, 2017

Current French military activity in Africa

Map: data from ‘France’s Military Is All Over Africa’ Jeremy Bender, Buisness Insider UK, 2015;‘Just How Closely Are US and French Forces Cooperating in Niger?’, Joseph Trevithick,

thedrive.com, 2017.

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44

The support of France for the notorious African dictator Jean-Bédel Bokassa illustrates how far France was prepared to go.

Bokassa had served in the French army before he seized power in theCentral African Republic in 1966. He was a corrupt and ruthless dictatorwho lined his pockets with both the profits of diamond production andmassive amounts of French development aid.

The French supplied the regime with financial and military support in orderto keep Bokassa within the French orbit. In exchange, Bokassa frequentlytook the then French President Valéry Giscard d’Estaing on hunting trips andsupplied France with uranium, which was vital for France’s nuclear andweapons programme. In 1975, Valéry Giscard d’Estaing, later an MEP andchairman of the European Convention which drafted the EuropeanConstitution, declared himself a “friend and family member” of the dictator.

In December 1977, Bokassa, who was a self-declared admirer of Napoleon Bonaparte,crowned himself Emperor of the CentralAfrican Republic. The coronation ceremonylasted two days and cost $22 million: aboutone quarter of the total Gross NationalProduct (GNP) of a country with fewgovernment services, huge infant mortalityand widespread illiteracy. Bokassa forced hisown people to finance this by way of

monthly payments. The ceremony was organised by the French artist Jean-Pierre Dupont, Parisian jeweller Claude Bertrand made the crown (whichincluded diamonds) and Bokassa sat on a two-ton throne modelled in theshape of a large eagle made from solid gold. The French Defence Ministersent a battalion to secure the ceremony, lent 17 aircraft to Bokassa and evenassigned French navy personnel tosupport the orchestra.

When he was confronted withinternational criticism, the FrenchCooperation Minister, Robert Galley,who represented Giscard d’Estaing atthe coronation, said: “Personally, I find itquite extraordinary to criticise what is totake place in Bangui while finding theQueen of England’s Jubilee ceremony allright. It smacks of racism” 73.

Only after public pressure arising from accusations of cannibalism (eatingpolitical adversaries and school children), did the French drop their formerally 74.

Emperor Bokassa’scoronation cost

$22 million; about a quarter of thecountry’s totalGNP

Democratic Republic of the Congo

Cameroon

CongoGabon

Democratic Republic of the Congo

Cameroon

Congo

Chad Sudan

SouthSudanNigeria

GhanaIvoryCoast

Gabon

Bangui

Central African Empire

Bokassa sat on a two-ton thronemodelled in the shape of a large eagle made from solid gold.

THE CANNIBAL

A latter-day Bonaparte? Like Napoleon, Bokassa served in the French Army but hispolitical capabilities failed to match those of his hero.

Feeding the beast: how EU subsidies areundermining Africa’s

agriculture

“If Africa is to have a future, Europe first of all has to bid farewell to itsdisastrous economic and trade policies. It must, once and for all, stop

subsidising its agricultural industry at the expense of developing countries. It must, finally, push for effective international measures against worldwide

land grabbing which deprives the world’s poor countries of their mostvaluable asset - arable land. Africa needs a broadly based sponsorship of

rural agriculture and a ban on imported ‘dumping’ products which undercut local food producers” 75

Dr. Asfa-Wossen Asserate, the great nephew of the last Emperor of Ethiopia Haile SelassieI, Ethiopian-German political analyst and consultant for African and Middle-EasternAffairs and best-selling author. He received Germany’s Federal Cross of Merit in 2016.

“Western farmers get to sell their produce to a captive consumer at homeabove world market prices, and they can also afford to dump their excessproduction at lower prices abroad, thus undercutting the struggling Africanfarmer, upon whose meagre livelihood the export income crucially depends.With the millions of tons of subsidised exports flooding the market so

cheaply, African farmers cannot possibly compete” 76

Dr. Dambisa Moyo, Zambian-born international economist, and author, currently serving onthe boards of Barclays Bank, Seagate Technology, Chevron Corporation and Barrick Gold.

PART TWO - THE CONTROL OF AGRICULTURE AND FISHERIES

Angelos Sepos, Lecturer at the University of Bath, points outthat the EU’s policy towards Africa is mainly driven by the

former colonial powers such as Britain, France, the Netherlands,Italy and Belgium; the European Commission’s DG of externalrelations, trade, energy, agriculture, development and aid;multinational oil, gas and mining companies such as Royal DutchShell, BP, ExxonMobil, Anglo-American, Rio Tinto and BHPBillington; and European agricultural and trade unions and theEuropean defence industry 78.

The European food industry is the largest manufacturing sector and biggestemployer in the EU. The agricultural and food lobby is the most influentiallobby in Brussels and has a decisive say over the CAP. Food manufacturersand foodstuff producers receive around 70 per centof the agricultural subsidies 79.

France also almost single-handedly created theCommon Agricultural Policy (CAP) in 1962 afterdemanding a system of direct money transfers fortheir farmers in exchange for agreeing to a commonEuropean market. The country remains the largest net beneficiary of theCAP’s subsidy system, receiving some €9 billion a year 80.

The CAP’s subsidy system pays out 38 per cent of the total EU budget tofarmers. The elite 20 per cent of beneficiaries receive 80 per cent of thetotal payments. For the 2014-2020 period, the EU will spend more than€360 billion on the CAP, with €278 billion issued in the form of directpayments to farmers, based largely on farm size, and €85 billion handed outfor rural development needs 81.

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46

“The most stupid, immoral state-subsidised policy in human history ... a program which uses inefficient transfers of taxpayers money to bloat richFrench landowners and so pump up food prices in Europe, thereby creating

poverty in Africa, which we then fail to solve through inefficient but expensive aid programs” 77

Charles Crawford, former British ambassador, award-winning speech writer, and founder ofthe Ambassador Partnership

France almost single-handedlycreated the CAP

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The CAP is a protectionist policy. Its subsidy, tariffs and pricing system arecarefully designed to protect the Common Market from the outside globalmarket and to promote the interests of the European food and agriculturalsector.

As France, Italy and other European countries did not want to expose theirfarming and food sector to more competitive Africanproducers, the trade preferences of the LoméConvention did not apply to the CAP’s specificagricultural products. Consequently, African agriculturalexporters were not able to exploit their comparativetrade advantage in various farming products. It wasimpossible for them to compete with the lower prices,offered by European producers, on the European market;lower prices, resulting from the CAP’s generous subsidy

payments and import tariffs.

The CAP’s lavish subsidies have enabled European producers to dump hugeamounts of heavily subsidised farming products on the markets of developingcountries, forcing local farmers and agricultural producers out of business.In this respect, these companies were helped by the policies of the WorldBank and the International Monetary Fund that forced the governments ofdeveloping countries to reduce their tariffs and subsidies in the name of freetrade. Continued on page 51

The value of European exports of cereals to ACPdestinations increased by 182 per cent from 1995to 2004.

Generous subsidy payments enable agribusinessesin Southern Italy to produce huge amounts oftomatoes. These vegetables are subsequently

dumped on the African market, causing unemployment and poverty,and leading in their turn to emigration to Europe. It is ironic thatformer tomato farmers from Ghana are now doing the same job -picking tomatoes - in Italy 84, completing a vicious circle.

The CAP’s subsidy system has been reformed several times but itsimpact has not changed. The CAP subsidies - together with thesubsidies of other developed states - create a constant inflated amountof supply, distorting the world market price, and keeping it on a levelthat is lower than it would have been without subsidies.

This has a huge impact on the incomes of farmers in poor developingcountries who strongly depend on the world market price for theirincome.

CEREALS

With the aid of various types of subsidies, inparticular slaughterhouses and feedstuff,European producers of poultry meat have beenable to build up a gigantic chicken breedingindustry. At the same time, the European poultrymarket is protected by way of import tariffs that

keep the price artificially high. Because European subsidies cover theproduction costs, the European poultry industry is very profitable. It

sells the popular chicken breasts to European customers and exportsthe residual meat to Africa where the frozen thighs and wings are soldfor rock-bottom prices. The local farmers and producers cannotcompete with these prices and many of them have been forced out ofbusiness. The local markets are flooded with cheap, subsidised poultrymeat. The value of European poultry exports to ACP states rose by113 per cent from 1995 to 2004 82. The European food industry,helped by the CAP, has caused much damage to Africa’s traditionalpoultry sector (small farmers, producers of poultry feedstuff, butchersetc.), leading to massive unemployment 83.

CHICKEN

The CommonAgriculturalPolicy is aprotectionistpolicy

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The EU and Africa

Illustrative is the detrimental impact of the EU’s (andUSA’s) cotton subsidies on the income and welfare ofcotton producers in Africa. Agricultural subsidies causea lower world cotton price of 4.8 to 18 per cent,leading in turn to a decrease of cotton farmers’ earningswho depend highly on the world market price 85.

According to Overseas Development Institute (ODI) estimates, EUcotton subsidies alone account for up to 38 per cent of annual incomelosses of cotton farmers in West and Central Africa. A worldwideremoval of subsidies would lead to a rise of the world market price,resulting in an increase of income for African cotton farmers.

The cotton sector in Benin is a good illustration. Benin is a formerFrench colony and one of the poorest countries in the world. Cottonproduction is not a traditional sector in Benin; it was imposed by theFrench colonialists. Now it is the most important sector ofemployment. As almost the whole cotton crop is exported to the worldmarket, cotton farmers in Benin depend highly on the world marketprice.

According to ODI, a worldwide removal of subsidies would lead to a18 per cent higher world market price for cotton with an increase ofearnings from cotton production for Benin’s farmers by 15 to 36 percent 86. Declining cotton world market prices, caused by subsidies, havea negative impact on the economic situation of Benin’s cotton farmersand their ability to pay for health care, education and food.

In sum, both the EU’s and USA’s cotton subsidies create poverty inBenin. Although the EU pays less agricultural subsidies to cotton farmersthan the USA in total, cotton farmers in the EU are subsidised muchmore per person and pound compared to the USA. The EU pays nearlyhalf of the amount of the USA’s cotton subsidies for just a fraction ofthe cotton production of the USA. As a result, the distorting impactcorresponding to every produced unit of cotton is on a much higherlevel in the EU compared to the cotton production in the USA 87. TheEU and the USA use their power to keep their subsidy systems.

Dairy multinationals are exploiting rock-bottommilk prices to expand aggressively in West Africa.Between 2011 and 2016, milk powder exports -produced by heavily subsidised European farmers -from the EU to West Africa jumped from 12,900metric tons to 36,700 tons. Most of it is flowing to

plants in Senegal, Ivory Coast, Ghana and Nigeria where it is transformedinto liquid milk. West African farmers are struggling to compete. Therecent milk deluge risks smothering the local industry.

Adama Ibrahim Diallo, the president of Burkina Faso’s milk producersand mini-processors union, says that farmers in the region are graduallygiving up. He also warns that this problem is aggravating the securitysituation in the Sahel. “The sons of pastoralists become jihadists - not outof conviction but because there are no jobs. The problem ... is tied tooverproduction. The multinational companies’ strategy it to implant themselvesin West Africa to sink their milk in”. Bacar Diaw of Senegal’s dairyassociation FENAFILS agrees: “When large quantities of milk powder fromthe EU ... are sent to West Africa, our local milk producers have to shoulderthe burden” 88.

MILK

African political elites are also responsible for the poor performance of theiragricultural sector on the world market. During many decades, they haveneglected this sector and failed to invest in modern sustainable techniques.Half of the crop losses can be avoided by using modern sowing-seed,pesticides and mineral fertilisers. In Africa, approximately 40 per cent of thepotential harvest is lost because of plant diseases. Moreover, 20 to 40 percent of the real harvest is lost because of the poor transport, storage andprocessing capacities 89.

But an enduring investment in the local agricultural sector will only lead toimprovement if African countries are able to protect themselves fromagricultural dumping.

COTTON

Continued from page 48

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The winner takes it all: the exploitative systemof the EU’s fisheries

agreements“... the political economy of the Euro-African fishing agreements

does not augur well for growth and development in Africa, and it is especiallynot conducive to the sustainable management of Africa’s marine resources.That is, the fishing agreements are motivated by the convergence of Europe’s

demand for fish and the profit-making desires of European fishingcompanies, on the one hand; and the desire by local African political elites to

respond to economic crisis and to use their control over the industry forpersonal enrichment and political patronage (except in a few countries),

on the other” 90

Okechukwu C. Iheduru, Professor of Political Science, Arizona State University

The fishing industry is also a powerful actor in Europe. The CommonFisheries Policy (CFP) was set up in 1970. Its original architect was RaymondSimonnet, an official at the French fisheries administration assigned to theEuropean Commission. The Commission’s choices were strongly influencedby representatives of the French fishing industry like Jacques Huret, presidentof the Union interfédérale des armateurs à la pêche 91.

Existing French policies and practices were directly translated to the EUlevel. A price and support system similar to the CAP was introduced.

The newly created CFP allowed for the creation of a gigantic fleet of fishingships. The industrial scale of these fishing vessels led to over-fishing and thedepletion of fish stocks in European waters. Yet already high consumptionlevels of fish and fishery products continued to rise. Continued fishing inoutside waters became vital for the EU.

In order to alleviate its over-capacity of ships and reduce the pressure onfishing resources in EU waters, the EU made fisheries agreements (FAs) withAfrican and other coast states. Continued access to distant coastal waterfish stocks would secure employment in the fishing fleet, the processingindustry and related sectors, while simultaneously satisfying the rising internaldemand for fish 92.

Thus, FAs became essential for the CFP’s survival as a system. By exportingthe problem of over-capacity to the waters of developing countries, the EUwas able to reduce the pressure on fish stocks in its ownwaters, thereby reducing internal political conflicts overTotal Allowable Catches (TACs) and other issuesbetween its member states 93.

The fishing deals between the EU and developingcountries have always been a tool of exploitation, servingthe economic interests of certain segments of the EUfishing industry.

The history of these deals deserves close scrutiny in thepages that follow.

Following the Third United Nations Convention on theLaw of the Sea (UNCLOS III), which came into force in1983, developing nations had acquired the legal authorityover the fisheries resources in their EEZs. However, they lacked the financialand other means and experience to exploit their rich waters.

At the time, George Kent, Professor at the University of Hawaii, warned: “It is an illusion to believe that fishing can be as rewarding to the less developedcountries as it has been to the developed countries. (...) The richer countries wouldbe capable of squeezing the poorer countries in specific negotiations, and thegeneral trend of inflation would tend to make the earnings less and less valuable”94.

These were prophetic words. The fish stocks of African coastal waters wouldsuffer the same fate as other commodities.

At the negotiating table, poor and weak individual African coastal states wereagain confronted with their former colonial masters; this time in the form

Fishing dealsbetween the EUand developingcountries havealways been a tool ofexploitation

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54

of a powerful economic bloc. It was again the old relationship betweenmaster and servant. The terms of these agreements reflected this veryunequal relationship between the parties.

The mechanism of the FAs was that the coastal state concerned allowedEU-registered vessels to fish in its waters and that in return, the EU andvessel owners pay financial compensation.

Essentially, the agreements enabled the EU to manage the intensity ofexploitation of fisheries resources practically without any consultation ofthe coastal state.

Moreover, the asymmetrical balance of power resulted into a serious under-compensation. The total amount of compensation paid by the EU comparedto the actual value of the catches made by the fishing companies have alwaysbeen very detrimental to the coastal states. The latter were paid only smallsums. Most of these African governments have signed every agreement thatwas put forward to them, regardless of the status of their fish stocks.Essentially, they signed away their fish.

For example, during the period 1990-1993, Seychelles earned about $13.4

million from its FA with the EU, out of which $11.1 million was financialcompensation. The reported fish caught, however, was estimated at $75million, which meant that Seychelles earned just 18 per cent of the value ofthe reported catch made in its waters by EU fishing vessels 95.

The poorer the country, the less it is ‘compensated’.

In 1996 the government of Guinea-Bissau received $8.25 million in totalrevenue in exchange for fish with an estimated value of $78 million. Theprocessed value of seafood products from these resources was $110.42million, meaning that Guinea-Bissau only received 7.5 per cent of the endvalue 96.

Madagascar is one of the poorest countries in the world, more than 85 percent of its people live in poverty. Despite all its fairness rhetoric, the EUhas been systematically exploiting the island’s weakness.

A 2012 study revealed that the EU paid less to Madagascar than it did aquarter of a century ago while catching more fish. Between 1986 and 2010,the EU received 30 per cent more tuna (quota increase from 10,000 to13,300 metric tonnes) for a total fishing fee that had declined by 20 per cent.Taking into account inflation, the annual revenue collected for fisheries byMadagascar fell by 90 per cent over this period 97.

It is clear that the EU buys out fishing rights at a bargain price, reaping thepolitical and commercial benefits at the expense of the local population. Thisamounts to ‘robbing the poor to feed the rich’ 98.

The EU’s fishing companies capture the lion’s share of the value of the fish.

Traditionally, EU governments, that is to say their taxpayers, have subsidisedabout 80 per cent of the access costs for fisheries. The ship owners havecontributed to the remaining 20 per cent, which are solely licence fees.

A study, covering the then 33-year period of the FAs with developing nations(1980-2012) found that for agreements relating to tuna, EU governmentspay 75 per cent of the annual access fees. The study revealed that the fishingindustry only rendered about one-fourth of the cost of access. Furthermore,the fees paid by the industry amounted to 1.5 per cent of its revenue fromfishing for tuna, and 3.2 per cent of its revenues from other species in these

MADAGASCAR’S PLIGHT

In 1996, the government of Guinea-Bissau received just $8.25 million in exchange for fish with an estimated

value of $78m and a processed value of $110.42 million.

That’s just 7.5% of the end value.

MINISCULE EARNINGS

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The EU and Africa

waters 99. In other words, taxpayers in the EU are paving the way for fishingfleets to exploit the waters of developing nations while fishing companiespocket the profits. In this regard, the EU governments provide a “winner-takes-all” approach to arranging agreements between fishing companies andAfrican coastal states.

It is important to note that these FAs do not provide European consumerswith cheaper fish. The taxpayers never see the benefits. Instead, their hard-earned money is being funnelled to other member countries fishing sectors,who then exploit and profit from it. The main beneficiary of the FAs is Spainand Spanish fishing companies, followed by Portugal and France 100.

Africa’s ruling elites have also benefited from the FAs.

Most of these coastal countries are states with extractive institutions wherearbitrary power, corruption and systems of patronage are firmly embedded.Much of the money has simply disappeared or has been used by the localelite for personal enrichment or to strengthen the existing patrimonialstructures, rewarding (political) friends and party loyalists.

The European Commission itself has admitted that in many cases thecompensation funds were essentially ‘bribe money’, noting that: “the existing

financial compensation arrangements arelittle more than institutionalised corruption.Financial compensation per se is seen as the‘bribe’ to the Ministry of Finance; scientific andtechnical cooperation funds are seen as the‘bribe’ to the Ministry of Fisheries; thebursaries programme is seen as a ‘bribe’ toall senior members and officials who can useit to send favoured friends and relations onall expenses paid training junkets toEurope”101.

FAs’ payments have rarely been used tofoster the development of the domesticfisheries sector.

Little has changed over the years because

coastal governments decide how they make use of the payments. It isunclear how the earmarked financial support is spent.

For example, a series of interviews revealed thatfishermen of Cape Verde are not receiving any fundingor money from the government or other institutions.The annual EU payment goes directly to the Ministryof Foreign Affairs and thus the general national budget.No money is given to the country’s only fisheriesresearch institution and due to a lack ofcommunication between the EU and the Cape Verdeangovernment, it is unknown where exactly the moneygoes102.

By selling fishing licences to European and othercountries in order for foreign industrial trawlers to gain access to theirwaters, African governments are causing much harm and misery to their ownpeople. These agreements have led to over-exploitation, unemployment andunder-nourishment.

Verdant poverty: Cape Verde fishermen do not see any money from their government -funding comes in but it is then lost in invisible bureaucracy...

WINNER TAKES ALL

Spain has reaped the lion’sshare of the profit from EUFishing Agreements.

These fishingagreements haveled to over-exploitation,unemploymentand under-nourishment

56

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Crime pays“We have seen how the navy becomes a part of the corrupt team that receiveshard currency and turns a blind eye to the looting of their nation’s health” 103

Edouardo Loayanza, former World Bank fisheries adviser

The European fishing boats operating in the EEZs of developingnations are already highly subsidised by the CFP machinery.

In addition, taxpayers in the EU pay most of the financialcompensation for access. The large subsidies that these fleetsreceive enable them to invest in bigger and more efficient boats,which leads to an over-fishing capacity in developing nations’waters. Clearly, local artisanal fishermen are no match for thishighly specialised and expensively equipped and subsidised EUfleet.

Matthias Mundt describes how EU vessels operate, for example, in thewaters of Cape Verde:

“Purse seiners (large bag-shaped nets) are usually longer than 45 metres and thetonnage is normally above 100 GRT. The search for tuna schools is often carriedout by a helicopter, for which a landing platform is provided on the superstructure.Longliners engaging in the hunt for tuna are similar in size and sometimes equippedwith a processing plant including mechanical gutting and filleting equipment withaccompanying freezing installation. Pole-and-line vessels are smaller and use echosounders and/or sonars for detecting tuna schools” 104.

Some EU vessels are also taking part in illegal fishing. A 2001 audit by theEuropean Court of Auditors (ECA) reported frequent infringements rangingfrom the catching and landing of immature fish, to incomplete or incorrectlogbook entries (mostly under-declaration of catches), and finally to fishingin closed areas and violating crewing requirements 105.

A 2012 study by the UK-based charity Environmental Justice Foundation

(EJF) documented 252 reports of illegal fishingby industrial vessels in inshore areas off thecoast of Sierra Leone. Nine out of the 10vessels, which account for the majority of thereported activities, were accredited to exportto the European market. EU-accredited boatswent into exclusion zones and used bannedfishing equipment. Bribes, intimidation, and therefusal to pay fines were also documented alongwith photos of a local fisherman beatenunconscious 106.

Reports reveal several cases where a delegationof the European Commission came to the aidof the perpetrators. In 2004, a Tanzanian patroldiscovered that 25 European fishing boats hadbeen illegally operating in protected areas.Following the arrest of the crews of these boats,a delegation from the Commission’sDirectorate-General for Maritime Affairs andFisheries visited Tanzania. Though the boats’owners received a fine, several commentators in the country said that theresponse on the part of the Tanzanian authorities was not as punitive as itcould have been, due to the EU’s delegation’s influence107.

The high corruption in African coastal states enables foreign countries andship owners to get access to fish resources and to avoid prosecution ofillegal fishing if detected 108. Only when African nations clamp down oncorruption and strengthen their legal systems, aid and technical support forthe improvement of the monitoring and surveillance systems of thesecountries will make a difference 109.

The fishing companies pay bribes to observers on board and to marineinspectors on land. There have been many cases where boats are suspectedof illegal fishing, and even vessels that are blacklisted, have managed to dockin ports and trans-ship catches.

Breaking the law has proved to be lucrative for fishing companies, yet the

The search for tuna schools is

often carried out bya helicopter, forwhich a landingplatform is

provided on thesuperstructure

61

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EU still subsidises and funds fishing companies that have been repeatedoffenders. The more nefarious fishing companies take advantage of thesystem and the EU continues to reward them.

Over-fishing and illegal fishing in African coastal waters have devastatingconsequences for local fishermen and coastal communities. Their lives aredependent on fish as a main source of food, protein and income. Local small-scale fishing industries have been unable to compete with the EU’s advancedindustrial fleets.

The situation has become so bad that African fishermen are leaving theirhomelands by the thousands, seeking jobs in Europe.

According to Thomas Binet, fisheries scientist, the migration problem in WestAfrica started with a small group of small-scale fishers, and it has now movedon to African youth who seek employment and a better future in WesternEurope. He contends that the root of this issue lies with Europe and its“persistent illegal fishing” 110.

The lack of fish and monetary resources have caused fishermen to turn tothe profitable enterprise of smuggling people to Europe 111. Individualfishermen find passengers and organise these marine transports individually,sometimes earning tens of thousands of dollars a trip. This profitablebusiness of transporting people instead of fish has in effect sharply inflatedthe price of Senegal’s traditional fishing boat.

For example, in 2007 over 900 pirogues with approximately 31,000 WestAfricans attempted to migrate to Europe through the Canary Islands. TheUN estimated that 6,000 of these people died or disappeared during thisvoyage 112.

Victims of monster-sized trawlers: It would take the catch from 56 traditional Mauritanianpirogue boats, above, to match that of a single EU pelagic freezer trawler. This explains

why African coastal economies are in decline.

Victims of illegal fishing: the net effect of European trawlers fishing without permission is todegrade the livelihoods of local fishermen such as these men here on the Tanzanian coast.

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Much ado aboutnothing

“Since their revision in 2004, such agreements have failed to meet theirstated aim, improved management of fish stocks - indeed, they have

contributed to fisheries’ degradation. (...) In addition, EU agreements withthe ACP countries have certainly improved trade from West Africa to Europe,

but do nothing to generate national added value or sustainable profits.Furthermore, ten-year studies by the European Development Fund show thatfisheries investments chiefly concentrate on improving debarkation and fish-

storage facilities, along with the technical and sanitary aspects of fish packaging, with little to nothing invested in on-site fish processing” 113

Pierre Failler, Reader in Economics, University of PortsmouthThomas Binet, Head of Vertigo Lab, a think-tank specialised in environmental economics,

innovative tools for bio-inspired decision-making

The first FA was concluded with Senegal in 1979. The numberof agreements rose sharply in the 1980s, following the

ratification of UNCLOS and the accession of Spain and Portugal.In the early 1990s there was a peak with 17 agreements in 1991.Subsequently, their numbers have oscillated between 14 and 17.Between 2009 and 2013, the total number of agreementsdecreased to 11. Now the EU has active agreements with 12African countries.

The Commission claims that the gradual replacement of the FAs by so-calledFisheries Partnership Agreements (FPAs) since 2004 has substantiallyimproved the situation of poor coastal nations. In contrast to the FAs afixed amount (between 20 and 40 per cent) of the financial transfer ischannelled to targeted measures to help develop the local fisheries sector114.

However, this change is only cosmetic.

A 2015 audit of the FPAs with Mauritania, Madagascar, Mozambique and theSeychelles by the ECA found that the Commission’s control of sectoralsupport actions was limited and that the actions actually implemented by

the partner countries were in some casesdifferent from those agreed. Theinformation provided by these countrieswas not always verifiable. The ECA notesthat, “most actions were not traceable in thebudget, and the Commission had limitedassurances that the claimed actions wereactually undertaken and that the cost isreasonable”. The funds concerned were notfully used as intended in all these countriesand in some cases the funds were used forother projects and actions 115.

Next to this, the ‘partnership agreements’have facilitated the permanent transfer ofvessels to developing countries in thecontext of joint enterprises. Though thelatter are promoted as a method ofreducing EU fishing capacity, whilesimultaneously contributing to sustainablesocio-economic development in the coastalstates, they merely export excess EUcapacity, further leading to the over-exploitation of the fish stocks in the coastalstate 116.

Importantly, there is a systematic failure onthe part of the EU to focus on the localprocessing industry. One review of theagreement with Mauritania indicates thatthere is insufficient technical and financialsupport for the local processing that couldadd value to the catch117. Next to this, thereis the concern that by developing bilateraldeals, the EU is obstructing the developmentof regional fishery management policies.

“...in Africa’s coastal waters, illegal,unregulated andunreported fishinghas reached epidemicproportions. Thisplunder destroysentire coastal

communities whenthey lose

opportunities tocatch, process and

trade.”

Kofi Annan, May 8th 2014.(Lunch of African Progress Report

2014)

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The 2013 reform of theCFP renamed theagreements sustainablefisheries partnershipagreements (SFPA).

But at the same time theEU fleet continues to behighly subsidised by theCFP machinery even withall the problems thisentails for the coastalnations’ waters andcommunities.

The 2014 African ProgressReport notes that a large

part of these subsidies goes to fleets that are implicated in over-fishing inillegal fishing activities in African waters. “Via the European Maritime andFisheries Fund, the European Union will make around €6.5 billion (US $8.9 billion)available from 2014 to 2020 to support the fisheries sector. Despite appeals fromthe scientific community, the fund will subsidise investments - including the purchase

of new engines - that promote over-fishing. Mostof the benefits of EU subsidies flow directly topowerful fishing industry interests, notably thecompanies that operate large fleets from Spain”118.

Whatever the terms of the SFPAs, in practicemost African governments lack the capacity toeffectively patrol their coastal waters and are,therefore, not able to monitor or enforce theagreements.

The positive reciprocity of the SFPAs is afallacy. It is just a smokescreen designed tohide the EU’s agenda of exploitation.

Illegal fishing threatens coastal economies, such as inTanzania, that rely upon fish for consumption.

The positivereciprocity of theSFPAs is a

fallacy. It is justa smokescreendesigned to hidethe EU’s agendaof exploitation

PART THREE: THE CONTROL OF AFRICA’S MARKET, TRADE AND LAND

Whereas the fisheries agreements are essentially a resourcegrab, the EU’s Economic Partnership Agreements (EPAs)

are designed as an instrument to grab the African market.

The EPAs date back to the signing of the Cotonou Agreement in 2000 121.

The EU and ACP countries agreed to negotiate free trade agreements thatwould be compatible with World Trade Organisation (WTO) rules122. Underthe Lomé Convention, ACP countries enjoyed special access to the Europeanmarket for the sale of selected products. As this was discriminatory towardsother developing countries, this special access dispensation was to beterminated by free trade agreements between the EU and the 77 ACPcountries.

A market grab:theEconomic Partnership

Agreements“The African countries cannot compete with an economy like Germany’s. As a result, free trade and EU imports endanger existing industries, andfuture industries do not even materialise because they are exposed to

competition from the EU” 119

Günter Nooke, Personal Representative of the German Chancellor for Africa in theGerman Federal Ministry of Economic Cooperation and Development (BMZ)

“The EPAs would result in massive trade diversion in favour of the EU andaway from the third-country WTO members in whose name the ‘Cotonou

problem’ is supposedly being addressed” 120

Susan Sechler, Co-Founder and Managing Director of TransFarm Africa and SeniorAdvisor for the William and Flora Hewlett Foundation

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Under the EPAs, African states are encouraged to open up to 83 per cent oftheir markets to European imports, with the goal of eliminating tariffs andfees gradually over time. In exchange for opening up their markets, Africanstates receive customs-free access to the European market.

EU negotiators have presented the EPAs as mutually beneficial tradeagreements, saying they will stimulate economic growth and reduce povertyin Africa, improving the livelihoods of African people and creating jobopportunities. The argument is that Africa needs cheap intermediate goodsto be used as inputs in the production process, thus enhancingcompetitiveness, and finished products whose availability at lowers costs isgood for the African consumer. European officials have reassured theirAfrican counterparts that the EU is not seeking undue competitive gain inAfrica at the expense of the local industries or workers 123.

In reality, the EPAs are not about trade but about market control.

The EU and the countries of Sub-Saharan Africa are completely differentplayers on the world market and they also play by different rules. MostAfrican countries are poor and have weak institutions. Agriculture isdominant and there is only a nascent industry. Most farmers are small-scalefarmers and are not supported by huge amounts of subsidies.

The agricultural and food sector provides, for example, livelihoods for 70per cent of West Africa’s working population.Agriculture provides between 30-40 per cent ofthe region’s total GDP. As West African small-scale informal farmers cannot compete withheavily subsidised European food producers,tariff elimination will lead to unemployment andpoverty. The European Commission itselfanticipates significant import surges of up to 16per cent for onions, 15 per cent for potatoes, 16per cent for beef, and 18 per cent for poultry -thereby displacing domestic production in theregion 124.

As we have indicated on previous pages, the EU

has a history of dumping agricultural products on the African market.

The United Nations Economic Commission for Africa (UNECA) predictsthat in their present form, EPAs will increase European manufacturing andnon-manufacturing exports to the ACP grouping by up to 20 per cent.

Also important to note is that tariff liberalisation under the EPAs would leadto a considerable loss of government revenue.

Many African states are dependent upon tariff revenues for around 7-10 percent of total governance resources, rising to between 15 and 20 per centfor least-developed countries. According to one estimate, African countrieswill lose up to 40 per cent of total tariff revenues under a full EPA 125.

EPAs would impact on the industrial development of Sub-Saharan Africa.

More specifically, permanent removal of tariffs on intermediate and finishedproducts would make it more difficult for African countries to produce thesegoods in the future, thus curtailing the industrialisation process and relegatingthe African region to the perpetual production of raw materials.

In the same line, the EU has prevented African countries from imposing newexport taxes or increasing existing ones unless they can justify special needswith regard to revenue, food security, or environmental protection.

Charges upon raw material exports are normally used to encourage value-

Trading at a loss. Bulk carriers in the port of Toamasina, Madagascar. Economic PartnershipAgreements have resulted on African markets being flooded by cheap European agricultural

produce, to the detriment of their own farming communities.

African small-scale

informal farmerscannot competewith heavilysubsidised

European foodproducers

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addition within local industry. They are an essential development tool thatcan be used in promoting industrialisation and employment creation, and increating incentives to add value to local products rather than exporting themin their raw form126.

The EU’s insistence on the removal of export taxes results from its RawMaterial Initiative (2008) which states that: “Access to primary and secondaryraw materials should become a priority in EU trade and regulatory policy. The EUshould promote new rules and agreements on sustainable access to raw materialswhere necessary, and ensure compliance with international commitments atmultilateral and at bilateral level, including WTO accession negotiations, Free TradeAgreements, regulatory dialogue and non-preferential agreements”. The EU triedto eliminate export taxes in the WTO but this attempt was blocked by Brazil,Argentina and Indonesia 127.

The possible negative impact on regional trade and industrial developmentis also underlined by the United Nations Economic Commission for Africa(UNECA). UNECA has said that if the EPA between the East AfricanCommunity (EAC) and the EU is fully implemented, this region risks losingtrading opportunities with other partners, industrial output, welfare andGDP.

This UN body literally notes that:

“The bilateral deficit will increase given that the EPA does not representimproved market access for EAC countries to Europe over the short-to-midterm,as tariff eliminations are implemented.Local industries will not withstand the competitive pressures from EU firms, andthe region could get locked even more firmly in its role as a low value-addedcommodity exporter.Welfare in the EAC will likely reduce as a consequence of EPA. Most losses willbe accrued by Kenya - 45 million dollars - while the EU will register welfaregain of 212 million dollars.Intra-EAC imports could decline by 42 million dollars - mainly in manufacturing- while tariff revenues from EU imports would decline by 169 million dollars.The EPA adds to the potential complexity in rolling out an effective industrialpolicy due to clauses that impinge on the way domestic support measures areprovided.It prevents EAC from later applying a higher tariff rate on capital and

manufactured goods like pharmaceuticals, yet EAC countries might be in aposition to produce them in the future.It mainly benefits the EU which needs unrestricted access to strategic materialsproduced in EAC - as expressed in the 2008 EU Raw Materials Initiative”128.

Despite the EU’s rhetoric about free trade, the EPAs will also not reducethe EU’s agricultural subsidies. Nor will they tear down non-tariff barriers.Technical obstacles to trade, such as product standards and sanitary andphytosanitary (SPS) measures will continue to shield the EU market fromACP exports. African producers will continue to be hampered by stringentrules of origin (ROOs). EPAs will also not lead to a reduction of the highEU tariffs placed upon processed goods coming from Africa. Processedcocoa, for example, will continue to be subjected to protectionist measures.Cocoa raw materials, on the other hand, will continue to receive duty freetreatment in order to satisfy processors based in the EU 129.

Finally, the EPAs are a fool’s bargain.

They do not provide additional market access to the European market forAfrican countries. As the region already had access to more than 98 percent of the EU market under the Lomé Convention, the 100 per centcomplete access under the EPAs is in fact no surplus.

Countries such as Ghana and Ivory Coast signed the EPA because their elitesare keen on preserving the existing market advantages to keep a minimumeconomic performance.

Products on the CAP list are still excluded from full access. Moreover, themarket preferences, preserved by the EPAs, are shrinking because the EU isnegotiating free trade agreements with non-ACP countries in the productcategories, covered by the EPAs, with the exception of cocoa, of which WestAfrican countries are the main producers.

For example, in 2009 the EU concluded an agreement with American banana-producing countries, ending a long banana dispute (1993-2009). The EUagreed to gradually reduce its tariffs on bananas. This reduction of EU tariffsfor (much) more competitive banana producers applies from 1 January 2018and will have an impact on ACP banana exports 130.

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He who pays the piper calls the tune:

aid as a lever“How can we depend upon gifts, loans, and investments from

foreign countries and foreign companies without endangering ourindependence? The English people have a proverb which says,

‘He who pays the piper calls the tune’. How can we depend uponforeign governments and companies for the major part of our

development without giving to those governments and countries agreat part of our freedom to act as we please?

The truth is that we cannot” 131

Julius Nyerere, President of Tanzania from 1964 until 1985

The EU has utilised aid as a lever to imposethese EPAs on African countries.

In general, aid has been an essential tool for the EUin advancing its agenda. Aid payments have been tiedto economic interests, paving the way for Europeancorporate penetration.

In cases where aid is used to manipulate, control orcoerce the recipient into fulfilling the donor’s agendaor as a big stick to beat the recipient country intothe required shape, we speak of aid colonisation.

Aid becomes a colonising instrument when it is usedto influence the recipient government in order toachieve a particular donor agenda or when it enablesthe donor to impose a model of government in a

recipient country.Other cases of aidcolonisation includesituations where thedonor links aid tomilitary procurementor export promotionor when developmentaid is used to provideemployment tocitizens of the donorcountry. In general,aid packages tend to be filled with conditionalities that perpetuate a kind ofpaternalism towards the recipient country and undermine its autonomy 132.

The EU has always utilised different kinds of financial assistance to ensurethat African elites implement its political and economic objectives.

This policy of aid colonisation has obstructed genuine economicdevelopment and has had a very negative social impact in many Africancountries.

Under the Structural Adjustment Programmes (SAPs) imposed by the WorldBank and the International Monetary Fund on developing nations in the1980s and 1990s, lending and aid became dependent on rapid tariffliberalisation, state divestment from parastatals and deregulation of theprivate sector.

The EU aligned in the mid to late 1980s with these policies and made aidresources conditional upon the African countries’ implementation of SAPs133.This led to economic decline and much social hardship. In Kenya, forexample, relaxation of import controls under SAPs led to the flooding ofthe domestic textiles market with cheap, second-hand clothes from Europe.Industrial capacity utilisation in the textiles sector fell from an average of 70per cent prior to SAPs to 40-50 per cent in the 1990s, resulting in manyclosures of businesses and the loss of 70,000 jobs 134.

Following the relaxation of import controls in the 1980’sKENYA’S TEXTILE INDUSTRY - A FALL IN CAPACITY

Aid becomes a colonisinginstrument

when it is usedto influence the

recipientgovernment inorder to achievea particulardonor agenda

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THE ROAD TO POVERTY: THE UGANDAN EXPERIENCE

The EU’s aid package comes with a list of conditions. African countries aretold to spend European aid on projects from which only European firms areallowed to benefit. This ‘boomerang aid’ has obstructed development.

A good road infrastructure is the engine of trade and economic growth.

The European Commission is one of the leading donors in the road sectorin Sub-Saharan Africa with about €7.4 billion in EDF commitments over theperiod 1995-2011 135. A large proportion of these aid allocations have infact subsidised European construction firms.

One of the most notorious road projects is the Kampala Northern Bypass(KNB) project in Uganda. It is known as one of the most expensive roadsin Sub-Saharan Africa.

The project was funded by the EU up to €60 million. The bypass was to becompleted in 2005. The first contractor was Sterling, an Italian firm. Theconstruction process was characterised by extensive delays. The Italiancontractor was working at their own pace contrary to agreed timelines.People at the site claimed that much of the work was sub-contracted tosmaller firms while the main contractor was absent. The Ugandan publicopinion was not pleased with this situation and the then Transport minister,

John Nasasira,became one of themost unpopularministers in Uganda.A self-governingentity, the UgandaNational RoadsAuthority (UNRA)was established andstarted to operate inJuly 2006. Only in2009, almost five

years after its due date, was the Kampala Northern Bypass opened tomotorists. The second phase of the project was supposed to start in 2011.The EU insisted on a European firm as one of the pre-conditions for therelease of funds. Although Reynold Construction Company (RCC) wasevaluated as the best bidder, the EU insisted on a Portugese firm, Mota Engil.This was a constructor with little work experience in Sub-Saharan Africa,let alone in constructing a road in an urban setting. The objections andprotests of high government officials and people in UNRA were brushedaside. At the time, almost 90 per cent of the road funding was supported bythe EU and the World Bank. As expected, Mota Engil did not have theequipment to implement the project. The company has barely moved andin December 2017 the project was not even at 30 per cent 136.

In sum, KNB has become a project that never ends. Even when the projectwill be finally delivered, it will have obstructed economic growth. But in themeantime, Mota Engil and other European companies will have received hugeamounts of European taxpayers money.

A HIGHWAY TO HIATUS

Like the heavy traffic on the outskirts of Kampala (above), the Kampala Northern Bypass appears to be going nowhere.

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Stick and carrot: the imposition of theEconomic Partnership

Agreements“Control over government policy in the neo-colonial state may be

secured by payments towards the cost of running the state, by the provision ofcivil servants in positions where they can dictate policy, and by monetarycontrol over foreign exchange through the imposition of a banking system

controlled by the imperialist power...

Aid therefore to a neo-colonial state is merely a revolving credit, paid by the neo-colonial master, passing through the neo-colonial state andreturning to the neo-colonial master in the form of increased profits” 137

Kwame Nkrumah, President of Ghana from 1960 until 1966

As most ACP countries are highly dependent on EU marketaccess and EU development aid, the European Commission

was able to dictate the terms of the negotiations of the EPAs,utilising a take-it-or-leave-it approach 138.

In various statements, EU officials also linked development aid funds to ACPcountries to the condition of signing EPAs 139.

The EU pursued a stick and carrot tactic, using aid in some cases as a‘sweetener’ and in other cases as a ‘stick’ to impose EPAs on Africancountries.

For example, the EU engineered the convergence of the final stages of EPAnegotiations with the programming of the 10th EDF. The 10th EDF entailed€22 billion in grants and €2 billion in loan financing. The EU threatened toreduce the EDF by 50 per cent if the EPAs were not concluded in time, or

by 25 per cent if they did not correspond to the conditions imposed by theEU. Paul Goodison, researcher with the European Research Office,described this as the single largest ‘institutional bribe’ in the history ofdevelopment 140.

The European Commission has utilised EU budget support as an instrumentto push for trade dismantling under EPAs.

Uganda was, for example, told that it would only receive budget supportafter having accepted a full EPA. Funds were specifically transferred to theMinistry of Trade in order to strengthen its capacityto implement the EPA. In this way, the EU’sinterests are defended within the governmentstructures of Uganda, by the key ministry, fundedby EU financial aid.

A fully implemented EPA would have a negativeimpact on Uganda. Around 31 per cent of allgovernment revenue is derived from import tariffs.Tariff liberalisation will affect the poultry, textiles and cereals sector, and thesmall-scale farmers will suffer. But the objections and concerns fromUgandan trade unions and private sector organisations were brushed asideby the Ugandan elites, who pushed through the negotiating process 141.

During the negotiation process of the EPAs, the EU also repeatedlythreatened to increase barriers against African imports as a way to putpressure on African states. When West African negotiators asked for anextension in the negotiations, the EU replied that failure to sign EPAs in timewould lead to higher tariffs and trade income losses. “For the West Africanregion, for example, more than €1 billion of trade would potentially be lost,as the average tariff to be paid under GSP is in average 20 per cent, 36 percent of today exports from Ivory Coast (€700 million) would face a tariff of27 per cent against Cotonou and EPAs, for Ghana it is 25 per cent of exports(€240 million). For Central Africa, about €360 million of exports wouldpotentially be lost”142.

Objections to tariffliberalisation werebrushed aside byUgandan elites

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Followers and dissidents“Our experts have established that the way it has been crafted, the EPA will

not benefit local industries in East Africa. Instead it will lead to theirdestruction as developed countries are likely to dominate the market” 143

Aziz Mlim, Tanzania’s foreign affairs permanent secretary

“It is important to emphasise the following: EPA will stifle existingmanufacturing industries as they will be uncompetitive as cheaper finished

products from European countries will flood Nigerian markets. TheECOWAS region, especially Nigeria, which is more industrialised, will

witness unbridled importation which will lead to accelerated shut down of thefew surviving industries in the region. This will further de-industrialise theregion and would have catastrophic implications on employment generation

thereby worsening the poverty situation in the region” 144

Frank Jacobs, President of Manufacturers Association of Nigeria (MAN)

The EPA negotiating process between the EuropeanCommission and seven different regions started in 2002 and

was due to expire in December 2007.

Fifteen years later only two of the seven pacts have been signed, one withthe South African Development Community (SADC) EPA group (Botswana,Lesotho, Mozambique, Namibia, South Africa and Swaziland) and one with

the Caribbean. The EPA with West Africa is currentlyblocked by Nigeria, Gambia and Mauritania whorefuse to sign. Tanzania is blocking the EPA with theEAC. Negotiations are still ongoing on an EPA withthe Central African region.

Many African countries are Least DevelopedCountries (LDCs) and see little benefit from agreeingto EPAs that would eventually force them to open upto a free inflow of EU goods.

At the beginning of 2018, Kenya and Rwanda were

the only two member states of the EAC that signed and ratified the EPAwith the EU. Following Tanzanian resistance, Uganda put the deal on hold.Because the EAC is a Single Customs Territory, the other EAC members,Tanzania, Uganda and Burundi must sign the agreement to make itenforceable.

Burundi, Rwanda, Tanzania, and Uganda are all Least Developed Countries(LDCs). Kenya is the only non-LDC. Should the deal fall through, Kenyawould fall under the GSP and its exports would be exposed to heavytaxation - estimated to range between eight and twelve per cent of theirvalue. The other EAC states would still access the European market duty-free and quota-free as LDCs 145. Exports to the EU from EAC are dominatedby coffee, cut flowers, tea, tobacco, fish and vegetables. Imports from theEU into the region are dominated by machinery and mechanical appliances,equipment and parts, vehicles and pharmaceutical products.

Dr. Fred Muhumuza, Kampala-based economist, says that his country shouldstop focussing on the EU because the UK, as one of Uganda’s key partners,is leaving. In his view, the EPA does not add much value to trade 146.

Although the Tanzanian government also refers to the uncertainty around

TANZANIA’S MINING INDUSTRY AS PERCENTAGE OF GDP - 1998-2012

Sour

ce: J

ourn

al o

f Pol

itica

l Risk

1998

2000

2002

2004

2006

2008

2010

2012

5%

4%

3%

2%

1%

0

UgandaKenya

Burundi

Rwanda

Malawi

Zambia

D.R.C.

TANZANIA

Tanzania has seen a threefold increase in mining productivity in the last two decades -President Magufuli has now pushed for processing plants at home to take advantage of her

natural resources

Many of the leastdeveloped Africancountries see littlebenefit from beingforced to open upto a free inflow ofEU goods.

Brexit, its main concern is that the agreement will have negative implicationsfor Tanzania’s industrialisation strategy 147.

Tanzania says it wants to build up and protect itsown manufacturing industries. According toBenjamin Mkapa, former President of Tanzania, a

reduction of tariffs on 90 per cent of allindustrial goods will harm the existing localindustries of Tanzania and also discourage thedevelopment of new industries 148.

Tanzanian officials emphasise that theremoval of export taxes on raw materials will

deny their country a standard industrial policythat was used by all of the developed nations to

keep raw materials at home and available for useby domestic manufacturers. EPAs will open upaccess to raw materials for use by European high-tech manufacturers.

Tanzanian President John Magufuli says that hiscountry should not be exporting the mineralsands from gold mining to be processed into tin,copper and silver abroad. Instead he calls forprocessing plants to be built in Tanzania and tofurther develop markets for copper and silver.

Benjamin Mkapa points out that the EPA will alsonegatively affect African regional economicintegration. Locking in old North-South tradeflows under the EPAs will undermine efforts atbuilding new South-South regional trade ties.African countries buy more manufactured goodsfrom one another than do others. Inter-Africantrade is, therefore, far more important for theregion’s ambitions to industrialise 149.

The concerns of Tanzania are shared by Nigeria.

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During a special session of the European Parliament in February 2016,Nigerian President Muhammadu Buhari said that an EPA with the EU wouldblock the industrialisation strategy of his country.

According to Olusegun Aganga, former Nigerian Minister of Industry,ECOWAS countries have always been dependent on theimportation of industrial products. If Nigeria signs anEPA, it will no longer be able to introduceprotective policies to promote industrialdevelopment or diversification. In any sector inwhich the EU has a production capacity, freetrade will hinder the development ofproduction capacity in Africa 150.

Representatives of Nigeria’s industrial sectoremphasise that Nigeria should only sign acomprehensive free trade agreement after it hasbeen adequately industrialised and thus be able totrade industrial goods competitively.

A glance at world economic history shows us thatTanzania and Nigeria are right. Nations developedafter they had diversified into manufacturing and services that provideincreasing returns. But to achieve industrial development, countries firsthad to intervene in their economies and trade relations by way of protectivetools.

The EU has in fact kicked away the ladder of African industrial development,denying the history of economic development of its own member states.

Nigerian President Muhammadu Buhari

Tanzanian PresidentJohn Magufuli

African countriesbuy moremanufacturedgoods from oneanother than doothers. Inter-African trade is,therefore, far moreimportant for theregion’s ambitionsto industrialise

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The new colonial trap:the paradox of

Belgian chocolate andGerman coffee

“The impact of such charges (the EU tariffs on chocolate and roasted coffee) goes well beyond lost export opportunities. They suppress technologicalinnovation and industrial development among African countries. Thepractice denies the continent the ability to acquire, adopt and diffuse

technologies used in food processing. It explains to some extent the low level of investment in Africa’s food processing enterprises.

Usually, the know-how accumulated from food processing exports such ascoffee could be adopted for use on other crops and in other sectors. This in

turn would help to stimulate industrial development and generateemployment. Being defined as raw material exporters undermines

technological innovation in the wider economy, not just in agriculture” 151

Calestous Juma was Professor of the Practice of International Development at Harvard Kennedy School, and internationally recognised authority in the application

of science and technology to sustainable development

The EU’s trade regime is designed to sustain Africa’s role as aprimary commodity exporter to Europe.

Cocoa and coffee are the archetypal case studies of how African countrieshave failed to extract value from their raw materials. These tropical productsexemplify the colonial trap.

Chocolate is big business. The world market for chocolate is worth $100billion. The world demand for chocolate stands at around three milliontonnes actually 152.

Belgian chocolate is, for example, famous across the world. The chocolatebox is one of Belgium’s most important trade marks. But there is no suchthing as Belgian chocolate.

The climate of Belgium does not allow cocoa beans that produce chocolateto grow. The cocoa tree thrives in warm and humid regions near theequator. Up to 70 per cent of the world’s cocoa is produced by 2 millionfarmers in a belt that stretches from Sierra Leone to Cameroon. Ivory Coastand Ghana are the giants, being respectively the world’s first and secondproducers of cocoa.

Although African farmers produce the cocoa beans, they are not the onesearning the vast profits. Their share of value in the cocoa value chain isestimated at only 3 to 6 per cent. The profits are being made further up inthe supply chain.

The cocoa supply chain starts at the cocoa plantations in ‘protected areas’.From there, middlemen transport the raw beans to the port cities wherethe beans are sold to cocoa trading firms Olam, Cargill and Barry Callebaut.They ship the cocoa to the big chocolate manufacturers in Europe andNorth America, including Nestlé, Mars, Ferrero and Mondelez, who processthe beans to make chocolate and cocoa powder.

CHOCOLATE BAR - PROFIT SHARES

Almost half of the valuegoes to the retailers inEurope and the U.S.

... in 2018, their share is estimated at just 3% to 6%

A third of the value goes to manufacturersin Europe

In 1981, farmers gotabout 16% of the share...

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A third of the value goes to chocolate manufacturers and almost half toretailers such as supermarkets, in Europe and North America. Revenuedistribution has deteriorated since the 1980s, when farmers received anaverage of 16 per cent of the value of a chocolate bar153.

Even today the countries of West Africa have continued their role as supplierof raw cocoa beans; they have been unable to leapfrog to chocolatemanufacturing.

Manufacturing costs are high. Evidently, it is also very costly to ship chocolatebecause it has to be transported in cold storage containers. Research &Development represent the bulk of costs in chocolate production, whichhas historically been aimed at the taste of European and North American

consumers. As chocolate is too expensive forthe majority of African citizens, there is only aweak domestic market154.

Last but not least the chocolate industry inEurope and North America has an interest inpreventing West African countries from settingup their own chocolate production facilities.That is why the EU charges a tariff of 30 percent for processed cocoa products likechocolate bars or cocoa powder, and 60 percent for some other refined products containingcocoa. Why would an African entrepreneur takeall the risks and incur all the costs describedabove if the final product of his enterprise is soheavily penalised by the EU?

Meanwhile, international cocoa prices havecollapsed by one third in the 2016/2017 period. This price crash showedagain how vulnerable Africa is to the volatility of commodity markets. Theprice slump had a serious impact. Cocoa farmers’ incomes were slashed,governments lost billions of dollars because of decreasing cocoa exportearnings and child labour resurged on cocoa farms.

The story of coffee is similar.

Germany is the second largest exporting country of roasted coffee in theworld right behind Brazil. Although Germany does not have a single coffeebush, the country is one of the world’s coffee giants.

Africa is one of the places in the world where coffee beans are grown. In2014, Africa earned nearly $2.4 billion from exporting green coffee beans.By comparison, Germany alone earned about $3.8 billion from coffee re-exports.

Many of the unprocessed green beans that Germany imports, are merely re-exported. The remainder of German coffee re-exports are sold as roastedcoffee or made into instant coffee.

African countries mostly export green coffee instead of roasted beans whichcould be sold at a much higher price. As a result, African coffee growersonly receive a tiny share of the value of roasted coffee sold in thesupermarkets of Europe and North America.

The majority of African farmers and cooperatives cannot afford mills orother machinery to process the harvested coffee beans. Good quality coffeeis washed. This means keeping the beans wet before they are roasted. Thisrequires expensive equipment. Therefore, most of the farmers sell the beansdirectly after the harvest. Because of the bad transport infrastructure,farmers are dependent on middlemen who only give them low prices fortheir beans. The roasting process demands much electricity and water. In

The chocolateindustry in Europeand North Americahas an interest inpreventing WestAfrican countriesfrom setting up theirown chocolate

production facilities.

European addiction: fed by African coffee beans and chocolate

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Africa, water is expensive and electricity unreliable. Moreover, roasted coffeeonly has a short shelf life. Fast transportation is imperative. But transportinfrastructure in most African countries is characterised by delays in deliveryand a long transport time 155.

Proximity along the value chain is one of the key factors in explainingGermany’s success. Unlike Africa, Germany has a first-class logistical system.German transporters are able to get the roasted coffee to supermarketsacross Europe very quickly and to maximise shelf life.

German coffee processors are also protected by EU tariff barriers. Whereasnon-decaffeinated green coffee is exempted from the charges, the EU slapsa 7.5 per cent charge on roasted coffee imports. There are at least eight

different EU schedules imposed on coffee importsdesigned to protect an industry that does not exist156.

By refusing duty-free access for manufactured productsfrom Africa, the EU has cemented the traditional colonialcore-periphery ties. The EU’s system of escalating tariffsthat start at zero for raw materials and increaseincrementally as the exported products get processed,obstructs the development of a manufacturing industry inmany African countries.

There have been African producers who have spent hugeamounts of money on marketing, advertising andpackaging, trying to attract European consumers.

However, they have failed to penetrate the highly concentrated coffeemarket, dominated by a few big players. About 40 per cent of the worldcoffee trade is controlled by four large coffee traders: Ecom, Neumann, LouisDreyfus and Volcafe. Half the global market is for roasted and processedcoffee, and is controlled by five companies: Kraft, Sarah Lee, Nestlé, Procterand Gamble, and Tchibo. Nestlé is said to control about 50 per cent of theworld market for instant coffee157. Without connections, it is difficult to sellproducts and enter into the distribution channels. Moreover, most of theEuropean consumers want particular European brands.

As global demand for chocolate booms, the chocolate trade andindustry is driving massive and illegal deforestation in several Africancountries, fuelling a catastrophic decline in wildlife.

Cocoa traders transport beans grown illegally inside protected areas,where rainforest has been burned down and replaced by coffeeplantations. Ivory Coast is losing its forests at a faster rate than anyother country. According to the organisation Mighty Earth, 291,254acres (117,900 hectares) of protected areas were cleared between2001 and 2014. In total, Ivory Coast is estimated to have lost morethan 80 per cent of its forest since independence in 1960. Over thesame period, Ghana lost 7,000 square kilometres (2,700 square miles)of forest, or about 10 per cent of its entire tree cover.

Many of the officials charged with protecting the forests are takingkickbacks for turning a blind eye to infractions. The middlemen whosupply the big brands are indifferent to the provenance of the beans.

In this way, illegal or ‘dirty’ beans are mixed in with ‘clean’ ones in thesupply chain.

G H A N AI V O R Y C O A S T

TREE LOSS - IVORY COAST AND GHANA SINCE 1960

IVORY COAST

TREES LOSTSINCE 1960

80%GHANA

TREES LOSTSINCE 1960

10%

THE CHOCOLATE BOX: THE SWEET POISON

About 40 percent of theworld coffeetrade is

controlled byfour largecoffee traders

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Dirty energy: The EU’s energy policy

and land grabbing“Europe’s consumption of biofuels translates directly into the loss of lands,water and food for rural communities in the South. Each hectare of land

that gets converted to biofuel production to fill European cars has a cost, andthese communities are the ones paying for it”

Devlin Kuyek, researcher with NGO Grain

“Europe’s biofuels are not only greedy for land, but also make climate changeworse and force food prices up. European governments must step in to stopcrops being used to fuel cars. We need a truly green transport system thatserves people and the planet, not biofuels that damage communities and

wreck the environment” 158

Robbie Blake, biofuels campaigner for Friends of the Earth Europe

The EU’s energy policy is partly responsible for land grabbingin developing nations across the world.

A ‘land grab’ refers to a situation where land traditionally used by localcommunities is leased or sold to foreign investors (from corporations orgovernments). It is about taking possession of and/or controlling a scale ofland for commercial/industrial agricultural production which isdisproportionate in size in comparison to the average holding in theregion159.

Land grabbing has serious consequences for the local population. Landacquisition by foreign corporations is profit-oriented and largely for exports.The expansion of cash crop monocultures diverts food producing resourcesand labour to cash crop production. If peasant farmers lose access to landand related natural resources, they have less food to produce and to eat.

Most of the land grabs are linked to concerns about food supply. Foodimporting countries like Saudi Arabia and South Korea aim, for example, atsecuring access to grain.

According to a 2010 report from Friends ofthe Earth, a third of the land deals arereported to be for land to grow agrofuelcrops to supply overseas markets.

Agrofuels are the liquid fuels derived fromfood and oil crops produced in large-scaleplantation-style industrial productionsystems. These agrofuels are blended withpetrol and diesel for use primarily astransport fuel. Biofuels refer to the small-scale use of local biomass forfuel160.

The NGO Grain pointed out that there were 293 reported land grabsaround the world between 2002 and 2012, covering over 17 million hectares,where the stated intention of the investors is the production of agrofuels.

The expansion of cashcrop monoculturesdiverts food producingresources and labour tocash crop production.

Fuel not food: First world consumers’ drive for ‘sustainable’ fuel deprives many economies inSub-Saharan Africa of the means to produce sufficient food for their own populations.

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Predictions are that global demand for agrofuels will hit 172 billion litres by2020, up from 81 billion litres in 2008. At current production levels, thatwould mean an additional 40 million of hectares of land would have to becoverted to growing crops for agrofuels.

The EU, together with USA and Brazil, account for 80 per cent of globalagrofuel consumption. Of the three, the EU is the only one that relies heavilyon imports of feedstock (crops brought to Europe for processing intoagrofuels) as well as food imports to replace European oilseeds that arediverted into agrofuel production.

In sum, the EU’s agrofuels and bioenergy policies are largely responsible forthis rush for land.

In 2009, the EU adopted the Renewable Energy Directive (RED)161. Thisdirective aims at reducing greenhouse gas emissions through the significantscaling up of forms of energy classed as renewable, including agrofuels andthe production of energy from burning wood.

Under following proposals, biofuels based on food crops can only accountfor half (5 per cent) of the total target of 10 per cent of the transport fuelconsumption. The rest of the biofuel contribution has to come from non-food sources.

This will work out to 21 Mtoe (million tonnes oil equivalent) of agrofuels,most of which will be biodiesel made from oilseed crops or palm oil. TheEU would have to devote 21 million hectares to agrofuel production to meetits 2020 demand at current yield levels. That is nearly double the total areaplanted to oilseeds in the EU in 2012 - more than the entire area of arableland in Italy and Spain combined162.

The EU has, therefore, induced EU-basedprivate and finance capital companies toconclude land deals in West and CentralAfrica and in other developing countriesto invest in oil seed crops for agrofuels toreach its targets 163. European companieshave dominated the land acquisitions foragrofuels in Africa 164.

In addition to land grabbing, this policy hasled to deforestation and the destruction ofpeoples’ and animals’ livelihoods 165

In January 2018, the European Parliament voted to limit the support tobiofuels made from food crops to 2017 national consumption levels andnever higher than 7 per cent of all transport fuels. It also removed biodieselmade from palm oil from the list of biofuels that can count towards therenewables target in 2021.

In addition to landgrabbing, this policy

has led todeforestation andthe destruction ofpeoples’ and

animals’ livelihoods

BIOFUEL DEMAND WORLDWIDE

BILLIONLITRESin 2008

BILLIONLITRESin 2020

THAT’SANOTHERMILLION HECTARESOF FARMING LANDFOR AGRIFUELS

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A game of shadows: theEuropean Investment

Bank and the quest forraw materials

“This is the sort of thing you expect in a John Le Carré novel - not in reality. What we see so far is that important evidence about allegedcrimes by a major multinational company in Zambia has been repeatedlyconcealed by a bank which is wholly owned by the UK and other EU

countries. How are developing countries supposed to collect the tax billionsthat multinational companies owe them, when the European Union’s ownbank is in what appears to be a conspiracy of silence with a company

accused of being one of the perpetrators?” 166

Rachel Baird, Senior policy journalist at Christian Aid

In different cases, loans from the European Investment Bank(EIB) have benefited Western companies and the EU’s quest forraw materials rather than the local population.

The EIB is the EU’s bank. The 28 member states of the EU jointly providethe EIB’s capital, their respective contributions reflecting their economicweight, expressed in GDP, within the EU.

The EIB provides money for projects that ‘contribute to EU policyobjectives’. About 90 per cent of the loans go to projects in EU countries.Ten per cent of the EIB’s portfolio is invested outside Europe.

The EIB has become the largest multinational borrower and lender in theworld. With assets of €573 billion, it is twice as large as the World Bank.The EIB is a major financier of development projects in ACP countries. Themain instrument for loans to Africa and the Caribbean is the Investment

Facility (IF). It is a €3 billion fund that pumps loans profits back into thefacility and reinvests them in new operations. The IF is financed by the EDF.In addition to these funds, the EIB has own resources which are funds it hasacquired on international money markets.

The ACP IF was created in 2003. In the period 2003-2013, it providedlending of €3.3 billion in Africa, the Caribbean and the Pacific 167.

The decisions on the projects are taken by the EU’s finance ministers andthe European Commission, whosit on the EIB’s Board ofDirectors. The role of ACPcountries is merely advisory168.The real power lies with theEIB’s Management Committee.This nine-member committeeoversees the daily running of theEIB and prepares the decisionsfor the Board of Directors.

The EIB has become thelargest multinational

borrower and lender in theworld. With assets of

€573 billion, it is twice aslarge as the World Bank.

Copper, so vital for electricity and plumbing in Europe. However, African mines receivingEIB loans for its extraction have exploited local citizens, in terms of both low wages and

poor labour standards, and have also polluted the environment.

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The EIB is a very political institution; its decision-making process ischaracterised by horse trading.

Between 2006 and 2016, a quarter of the EIB’s ACP funding went into energyprojects (€2 billion) and 5 per cent financed mining operations 169.

The EIB claims that projects in the mining sector are bringing value toindigenous natural resources, increasing export revenues and generatingfiscal income for the countries concerned through royalties and corporatetaxes.

In reality, some of these firms have exploited local citizens, in terms of bothlow wages and poor labour standards, and have also polluted theenvironment.

Several NGOs have, for example, documented how EIB loans of around €100million to subsidise the mining operations in the Tenke Fungurume Mine inthe DRC led to much hardship for the local population 170.

In Madagascar, the EIB helped finance Ambatovy, a huge mining project withfive components impacting 200 square kilometres of land and involving

several multinational corporations.Since operations started in 2007, theinhabitants have complained of thenegative effects of the projects on thesurrounding environment 171.

In addition, the EIB has supportedmining firms who have avoided taxeson a large scale.

Early March 2011, a leaked auditreport, demanded by the Zambiangovernment, revealed that MopaniCopper Mines (MCM), a Zambianmining firm, had avoided paying tens ofmillions of dollars in local tax. It had

siphoned off its profits out of Zambia to the benefit of its Swiss basedmother company, Glencore Xstrata. The audit concluded that the companyhad been both artificially inflating costs and using transfer mispricing methods

(selling its commodities much below market prices to its mother company)to minimise the profits in order to pay less taxes 172.

In 2005, the EIB had granted MCM a €48 million loan (£30m) for therenovation of a smelter to reduce sulphur dioxide emissions.

After an internal investigation, the EIB concluded in 2015 that it had beenunable to establish whether MCM had avoided paying local taxes but refusedto release this report.

Subsequently, the European ombudsman, Emily O’Reilly, accused the EIB offlouting its own transparency rules.

Trucks exiting Zambian border: the trouble is that taxation owed to the Zambian state has similarly departed.

A Zambian mining firm had avoided payingtens of millions of dollarsin local tax. It hadsiphoned off its profitsout of Zambia to thebenefit of its Swiss basedmother company.

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The curse“Poor natural resource governance and management in Africa is a

consequence of a complex set of dynamics, which should not be attributedonly to foreign multinationals. Our own poor state of governance, rampantcorruption and greed in the negotiations or rights to mining, logging, orfishing, which are always cloaked in secrecy, is largely responsible” 173

Alfred Dube, Director of the Addis Ababa office of the Institute for Security Studies (ISS)

“In the case of African resource deals, offshore funds have been shown toconceal questionable transactions. In the 1980s, bribes were literally cars full

of cash and you handed the key to the official you were trying to bribe.Bribery now is much more sophisticated, and has become harder to define asbribery if it’s (through) offshore transactions or people being given equityshares in offshore companies ... You have to crack open a lot of offshoresecrecy to see the conflict of interest that lies at the heart of them” 174

Tom Burgis, investigative journalist and correspondent for the ‘Financial Times’, author of ‘The looting machine’

The EU’s external policies towards Africa in the field of trade,agriculture and energy are essentially a form of economicimperialism. By way of unequal trade arrangements, tariff andnon-tariff barriers to trade, unfair subsidies and conditioneddevelopment aid, the EU has efficiently pursued the interests ofEurope’s corporate industry and the interests of different memberstates at the expense of the population of Africa. The EU’sinstruments have legitimised and facilitated exploitation. Thispolicy has obstructed industrial development and undercut thecomparative advantages of African countries for labour intensiveagricultural products on the world market.

The process of exploitation of Sub-Saharan Africa by European political andeconomic elites, which started at the end of the nineteenth century, hascontinued. The unequal relationship under colonialism has never been

replaced by a real partnership betweenequal, sovereign nations. Many Africancountries are still operating underconditions of dependency.

The colonial pattern of trade is stillunchanged. Sub-Saharan Africa continuesto export unprocessed or only lightlyprocessed commodities. The continenthas not yet climbed the value-addedchain of mineral processing andmanufacturing. The very low level ofvalue-added in African mining is symptomatic of the very low level ofmanufacturing activity in the region’s economies. Measured in terms ofcontribution to regional GDP, the share of manufacturing has actually fallenfrom 15 per cent to 10 per cent since 1990. In 2012, Africa still accountedfor just one per cent of global value-added in manufacturing. That is thesame share as in 2000 175.

In sum, the EU’s policies have continued the colonial hierarchical relationbetween the European metropolis and the African periphery, under a newform and with new actors.

This policy of exploitation is based on and facilitated by a pact between theEU and the African ruling elites. During decades, the EU and Europeangovernments have supported and bribed the predatory regimes in power inorder to have continued access to the continent’s natural resources 176.

Throughout history, most countries in Sub-Saharan Africa have been classicexamples of states with extractive institutions or predatory states. In Africa’spolitical systems, there is no division between political and economic powerand predatory practices are firmly embedded. Most African leaders haveonly been interested in using their countries’ public institutions andresources to enrich themselves and cement their power. Volker Seitz, formerGerman diplomat, notes that many African regimes block the developmentof a good education system because they fear that a new, well-educatedgeneration could pose a threat to their position 177.

PART FOUR: AN INCONVENIENT TRUTH Many Africancountries are stilloperating underconditions ofdependency.

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Predatory regimes are characterised bycorruption. This involves the use ofpublic office and public funds for privategains. It is about graft, bribes, extortion,embezzlement, ‘ghost salaries’, over-invoicing, theft of foreign aid, selling ofgovernment contracts and licenses etc.

Transparency International rates sixAfrican countries as ‘extremely corrupt’and another 35 as ‘very corrupt’. OnlyBotswana emerges as a member of the‘slightly corrupt’ group, and no Africancountry is among the ‘least corrupt’group which includes most of theeconomically advanced world. Ninety

per cent of Africa’s population - roughly one billion of 1.2 billion - live undervery or extremely corrupt governments, a rate that exceeds most of therest of the world.

Corruption is undermining the efficiency and effectiveness of governmentpolicies, including the appropriate delivery of public monies to their intendedends. It hampers economic growth and causes damage to education.According to a 2002 African Union report, African economies yearly lose$148 billion, or about a quarter of the continent’s yearly revenues, tocorruption 178. Health care is also affected. A 2015 Audit Service SierraLeone report found, for example, that as much as one-third of the funds tocombat Ebola may have been used improperly 179.

Predatory practices and corruption have led to, what Professor Paul Collierhas described as the ‘natural resource trap’180. Instead of fuellingdevelopment, Africa’s natural resources have proved to be more of a cursefor its people, enhancing poverty and inequality, and serving only a small elite.

The resource curse and corruption are two sides of the same coin. Localofficials in Africa are more likely to be corruptible181. As transparency overresources by companies to governments is minimal, there is no publicscrutiny over government revenues and over the way in which resource

wealth is spent and distributed182. This enables local politicians and publicofficials to strike opaque deals with multinationals, corporate investors andbankers, allowing the latter to drain the continent’s resources. Local elitessign away resources in exchange for enormous bribes.

CORRUPTION

Only Botswanaavoids endemic

corruption

90%25%

of Africans live under corrupt governments

of African revenues lost to corruption

ALL THE PRESIDENT’S MEN (AND WOMEN)

The case of Equatorial Guinea is very illustrative. Equatorial Guinea isamong the top five oil producers in Sub-Saharan Africa and has apopulation of approximately one million people. After oil wasdiscovered in the early 1990s in this country, international energycompanies such as ExxonMobil began to extract the resource.Between 2000 and 2011, Equatorial Guinea was the world’s fastestgrowing economy, with output averaging 17 per cent. According tothe United Nations 2016 Human Development Report, the countryhad a per capita Gross National Income of 21,517 in 2015, the highestin Africa and more than six times the regional average. However, thereis a huge gap between the country’s wealth ranking and its social andeconomic development. The majority of the population lives in badhuman conditions. Although Equatorial Guinea had a higher GrossNational Income (GNI) in purchasing power parity per capita thanPoland in 2011, it also had a child mortality rate 20 times higher 183.

The organisation Human Rights Watch notes that in October 2017,President Obiang’s eldest son, Teodorin was convicted by a Frenchcourt of embezzling more than €100 million in state funds to purchasea Parisian mansion, exotic sports cars, and luxury goods. In an apparentattempt to shield him from accountability, Obiang appointed Teodorinvice-president in 2016, shortly after French prosecutors concludedtheir investigation184.

At the same time, Equatorial Guinea has failed to provide basic servicesto its citizens. According to a 2011 survey, about half the populationlacks access to clean water and 26 per cent of children exhibitedstunted growth, a sign of malnutrition.

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The Republic of Congo(RC), also known asCongo-Brazzaville, isthe neighbouringcountry of theDemocratic Republicof Congo (DRC). It hasa (small) population ofaround 4.5 million. ThePresident of RC isDenis Sassou Nguesso.He has been President

since 1997. He was previously President from 1979 to 1992. RC isthe fourth largest oil producer across Sub-Saharan Africa. Over 70per cent of RC’s economy comes from oil, and close to 80 per cent ofgovernment revenue.

Unfortunately, most of RC’s citizens have not profited from thecountry’s oil wealth. Over 40 per cent of Congolese citizens live onless than €1.25 per day. The country is an example of a predatorystate; inequality is extremely high.

In 2010 the International Monetary Fund (IMF) elaborated a debt reliefprogramme for RC. However, within the seven year-period 2010-2017,the country’s debt tripled. In July 2017, RC had a debt of $9.14billion185.

RC is one of the most corrupt countries in the world. Corruption iseverywhere.

In December 2017, the IMF sent a fact-finding mission to RC. Itconcluded that anti-corruption laws and regulations remain defunct,and called on the government to establish independent anti-corruptionwatchdogs. The IMF asked for high officials to submit a declaration oftheir assets and financial interests and for the government to introducepublic control mechanisms on state oil companies and big investment

projects186. Finally, certain financial fortunes based on oil activities haveto be clarified 187.

Earlier in 2017, the Swiss NGO Public Eye released a report about thelinks between the Geneva-based commodities trader Gunvor, theworld's fourth-largest independent oil trading company, members ofthe President's entourage and high officials of the Congolese state-owned oil company, the Société Nationale des Pétroles Congolais(SNPC). Denis Christel Sassou Nguesso, son of the President, was,until very recently, one of the main figures within the SNPC.

Four legal proceedings in Switzerland have been opened to investigatethis case. The president’s son replied that it is the RC’s sovereign rightto choose who it does business with. Gunvor refused to commentand has stopped all business dealings in RC188.

In June 2017, the president’s daughter, Julienne Sassou Nguesso, andher husband Guy Johnson were placed under investigation by Frenchinvestigators for “money laundering and misuse of public funds”.Among other things, investigators found that since 2007, millions ofeuros of state money had been funnelled from Brazzaville, the country’scapital, to offshore accounts in the Seychelles, on Mauritius Island andin Hong Kong. In March 2017, a nephew of the president, WilfridNguesso, was placed under investigation on the same accusation189.

Life’s essentials:Equatorial Guinea has a highergross national income than Poland, but its child

mortality rate is 20 times higher.

Local state companies are systematically undervaluing assets. Concessionsare then sold on terms that generate huge profits for internationalcompanies, mostly located in offshore centres.

The DRC’s mining sector has always been notorious for these practices.

Researchers analysed five trading arrangements between state companies inthe DRC with foreign companies. They concluded that annual losses fromthe five deals reviewed were equivalent to almost double the combinedannual budget for health and education in 2012. Across the five deals, assetswere sold on average at one sixth of their estimated commercial market

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value. Assets valued in total at US $1.63 billion were sold to offshorecompanies for US $275 million. Offshore companies secured very highprofits from the sale of these concession rights. The average rate of returnacross the five deals examined was 512 per cent, rising to 980 per cent inone deal190.

It is clear that many multinational companies are paying very little for theresources they are taking away from Africa. Foreign companies are makinghuge profits in the DRC and other resource-rich African countries but theseprofits are not translated into commensurate government revenues becauseof excessive tax concessions and tax evasion.

A GLORIOUS REVOLUTION: THE FALSE HOPE OF SOCIALISM

In many African countries, mining contracts have traditionally includedlow taxes, generous license terms, tax breaks and tax exemptions.These agreements were almost never made public.

Recently, some African governments have made a (radical) break withthe past.

On the initiative of John Magufuli, President of Tanzania, the Tanzanianparliament passed three laws in the middle of 2017: the Natural Wealthand Resources Contracts Bill, the Natural Wealth and Resources Billand the Written Laws Act 191.

These bills require the government to own at least a 16 per cent stakein mining projects, and raise royalties tax for gold, silver and platinumexports to six per cent from four per cent. The government is alsogiven the right to tear up and renegotiate contracts for naturalresources like gas or minerals, and remove the right to internationalarbitration 192. Mining companies are also required to train Tanzaniansand give preference to local suppliers.

In January 2018, the mining ministry issued nine separate miningregulations, requiring ‘indigenous Tanzanian companies’ to have at least

5 per cent equity participation in amining company. The regulationsstate that mining companies,contractors and sub-contractorsmust give preference to local financialinstitutions and legal services. Thegovernment must prioritise Tanzaniancompanies in granting mininglicenses193.

In the DRC, President Joseph Kabilasigned into law a new mining codethat was passed by parliament in lateJanuary 2018. The law raises royaltieson various minerals and alsoremoves a clause that protectedmining firms from changes to thefiscal and customs regime for ten years 194.

Experts emphasise that a new law in the DRC was needed for strongerrules, more transparency, opportunities for local development and anequitable fiscal regime.

On the other hand, a unilateral approach in the field of taxes coulddamage the country’s credibility with mining investors.

Similarly, President Magufuli’s unilateral and combative approach isinspired by domestic politics. He wants the Tanzanian people to seehim as the president that took on the multinationals. By using thelanguage of sovereignty and economic war, Magufuli is stirring popularmemories of Tanzania’s first president, Julius Nyerere195. Tanzania’sleaders should realise that their country needs foreign investment and,therefore, a stable legal environment. Fighting a battle in a populistway in the media can attract voters but will not improve the country’ssituation.

African governments should refrain from unilateral policies and

Harking back: the Socialistpolicies of past leaders like

Julius Nyerere are still attractiveto many African elites.

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negotiate a balanced agreement with corporations. They should insiston a duty for companies to help the local population and to do manythings for infrastructure, health care and the education system in theproduction areas.

It is essential that governments pursue the right policies. As RobertKappel, researcher with the GIGA Institute of African Affairs, notes:“What governments do with their tax revenue is up to them. If you look atthe budgets of most countries, there is not much money to help improve thesituation for the poor populations” 196.

The DRC is one of the most corrupt countries in the world. It isdoubtful whether higher tax revenues would benefit its poor citizens.Experts point out that the new law creates even more risks ofcorruption, self-dealing and conflicts of interests197.

In Tanzania, the government is increasingly undermining democracy andstifling free speech.

In February 2018, a court sentenced two opposition leaders to fivemonths in prison198.

In March 2018, the authorities charged the leader of a majoropposition party and five party members with inciting hatred andrebellion against the government199.

African dictators and predatory regimes have denied their people theopportunities to build a decent life. Most of the African emigrants are notgenuine refugees, fleeing war, conflict or persecution. They are young,unemployed people with a lack of opportunities who want to live in Europe.

That is why Asfa-Wossen Asserate, Ethiopian-German author, describesAfrican dictators and predatory regimes as the biggest exporters ofmigration in the world200.

As also many qualified Africans are leaving their continent, this brain drainhas a very negative impact on Africa’s economic and social development.

African countries feature, for example, prominently on the list of foreigners

working for the UK National Health Service (NHS). 2016 figures indicatethat there are 2,289 Ghanaian health staff working for the UK health system.At the same time, Ghana struggles to find critical health workers. SierraLeone has one of the weakest health systems in the world. In 2010, thecountry had 136 doctors and 1,017 nurses, translating to one doctor forapproximately every 45,000 people. However, in 2014, the NHS had 27doctors and 103 nurses trained in Sierra Leone working for it 201.

Migration from Africa to Europe is in the interest of Africa’s leaders. In thisway, they are able to export youth unemployment. Moreover, theremittances sent back home by emigrants are supporting the local economyand, therefore, the regimes in power 202.

Meanwhile, Mukhisa Kituyi, Secretary-General of the United NationsConference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD), has warned Africangovernments of a new debt crisis, as experienced in the late 1980s and1990s. Between 2006 and 2009, the average African country saw externaldebt stock grow 7.8 per cent per year, a figure that rose to 10 per cent peryear in 2011-2013 to reach $443 billion or 22 per cent of Gross NationalIncome (GNI) by 2013 203.

Brightest and best: contrary to popular opinion, most African migrants are not destitute, they include many highly-educated health professionals who leave their

corrupt homelands for a better life.

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It’s the institutions,stupid!

“The technical problems of the poor ... are a symptom of poverty, not a cause of poverty ... the cause of poverty is the absence of political and economic rights, the absence of a free political and economic system

that would find the technical solutions to the poor’s problem” 204

William Easterly, Professor of Economics at New York University (NYU) and Co-Director of the NYU Development Research Institute

“We want the resources that belong to African countries to be used forAfrica’s development, not misappropriated. Resources don’t belong toindividuals. They don’t belong to companies. They belong to countries’

interests” 205

Dr. Akinwumi Adesina, President of the African Development Bank

“Africa’s future will surely be built on its extractive industry, but the oil,timber and mining deals of the future must be open to scrutiny, producedecent levels of tax, and put national interest before a tiny elite’s greed.

That outcome depends on domestic political will. The looting machine reliesfor its existence on the complicity of African presidents, ministers and

members of parliament - once that cozy complicity ends, the lubricating oil will dribble away, and the machine will seize up” 206

Michela Wrong, British author and journalist

The process of exploitation by both ruling local elites andforeign actors can only be ended if the peoples of Africa startan internal institutional revolution.

A nation’s success is determined by the way the ruling elite has organised acountry’s political and economic institutions. If institutions are organised asinclusive, dispersing power among many, this institutional environment willcreate incentives of inclusive economic institutions that encourage privateproperty, uphold contracts, allowing most people to participate in economic

activities. Inclusive economic institutions pave the way for two crucialengines of prosperity: technology and education. If, on the other hand,political institutions are organised as extractive, concentrating power in thehands of a narrow elite and placing few constraints on the exercise of thispower, economic institutions are then often structured by the same elite toextract resources from the rest of the population and society. Economicinstitutions will then only serve the purpose of the ruling elites extractingthe maximum wealth for themselves 207.

If African nations want to achieve inclusive economic prosperity and ensurethat the resources go to the people, they have to build up inclusive politicaland economic institutions. Only then can they make an end to predatorypractices and corruption and to the unholy alliance with foreign powers.

Real independence is based on democracy and inclusive economicinstitutions. Only in this institutional environment, transparency and controlover mining deals and the use of resource revenues is ensured. If Africangovernments are controlled by their people, they will use the resourcerevenues from natural resources to foster human development, improveinfrastructure, education and healthcare, promote agriculture and build up amanufacturing or processing industry in different sectors ranging from thecoffee to diamonds sector.

African institutions will have to steer themselves in the future if they want to develop.

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PART FIVE: CONCLUSION - THE ROAD TO FREEDOM AND DEMOCRACY

How and why the EU intends to

shackle Britain like itshackled Africa

“Britain must suffer, and be seen to suffer, because only then will other EU countries realise the benefits of staying in the club. Making an

example of Britain, therefore, is the best tonic for populism” 208

Juliet Samuel, British journalist for ‘The Daily Telegraph’

We have explained how the EU has been controlling thecountries of Sub-Saharan Africa for decades.

More specifically, the trade agreements between the EU and Africancountries have never been about genuine free trade. These deals servedonly one purpose: enabling the EU to access and control Africa’s naturalresources. They were never meant to benefit both parties equally.

Both the leaders of France and the architects and founders of the EEC didn’twant to give up control over former African colonies. Therefore, the EECadopted France’s trade system, refining it during the next years and decades.

Now we can see something similar happening after the EU referendum resultof 23 June 2016 in the United Kingdom.

Brexit came as a shock to the EU elite.

Hans-Werner Sinn, Professor emeritus at the University of Munich, pointsout that the British economy is as big as all of the economies of the 20

smallest member states put together. Brexitrepresents 20 of the 28 member states leavingthe EU at the same time 209.

Consequently, the UK’s exit will affect thebalance of power among member states andalso the financial resources upon which the EUcan draw. Moreover, it will also significantlyweaken the EU’s global role 210.

Brexit also means that an exit from the EU hasbecome a legitimate and realistic option forother countries too. After the UK hasdemonstrated that a life outside the EU canbe very successful, the exit option will becomeeven more attractive.

That is why the EU is determined to demonstrate that it is an organisationin which its members must stay put, if not out of love, but because the exitfees are so exorbitant and the obstacles hard to overcome. The EU can,therefore, be described as a non-consensual community 211.

Moreover, the EU aims at keeping the UK in its sphere of influence. Also inthe post-Brexit era, the EU elite wants to continue to control and dictatemany of the UK’s laws and policies, limiting the UK’s sovereignty andindependence.

The European Council guidelines for the future EU-UK relationship of March2018 212 illustrate how the EU is trying to impose its laws and policies onthe UK, ranging from public procurement and tax laws to foreign policy andclimate change. The same mentality of control has characterised the EU-Africarelationship for decades.

As we indicated, the successive ‘trade’ arrangements and fisheriesagreements between the EU and the countries of Sub-Saharan Africa wereaimed at getting access to Africa’s raw materials and rich fishing grounds.

The future EU-UK agreement has the same in store for the UK.

Let us go back in time.

The EU is determinedto demonstrate that itsmembers must stayput, if not out of lovebut because the exitfees are so exorbitantand the obstacles hard

to overcome.

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FISHERIES: THE CONTINUATION OF A RESOURCE GRAB

The CFP was hastily stitched together by thefounding six member states of the EEC justbefore the start of the accession negotiationswith Denmark, Ireland, Norway and the UK.At a hastily arranged meeting on 30 June 1970,six hours before the negotiations began, theagriculture ministers of the “six” adopted theprinciple of ‘equal access’ to EEC waters. Thismeant that the principle of free access wasestablished as EEC law and that the candidatecountries would have to accept it withoutargument.

French intentions were clear. For instance, by1970, fishermen from Boulogne, Brittany andNormandy made no less than 65 per cent oftheir fresh fish catch in what would be theBritish Exclusive Economic Zone (EEZ) and 20per cent in the Norwegian and Faroe Islands’EEZ 213.

As Christopher Booker and Richard Northnote, “this was a trap aimed at appropriating theapplicants’ property, to share it between theCommunity members” 214.

The CFP was thus essentially designed as aresource grab. By imposing from the outsetthe non-negotiable dogma of free access,Britain’s rich fishing grounds and fish stockswere turned into a common resource thatmust be shared with other EU member states.It is as if the Champagne region was taken

from France and its vineyards distributed among the different memberstates.

The CFP is probably the greatest historical injustice, imposed by theEU.

Now the EU is linking the continued access of its member states’ fleetsto the UK’s waters to the sale of the UK fisheries products on thecontinent.

Echoing the earlier position of the EuropeanParliament’s Fisheries Committee215, theEuropean Council guidelines literally stipulatethat: “In the overall context of the FTA, existingreciprocal access to fishing waters and resourcesshould be maintained” 216.

The message is clear: if the EU memberstates’ fishermen are not able to fish in UKwaters in the same way as they did before, theUK will not be able to export their catch tothe EU27.

This linkage is unacceptable and must berejected.

“this was a trap aimed atappropriatingthe applicants’

property, toshare it

between theCommunitymembers”

Edward Heath’selection victory wasknown to trigger

UK entrynegotiations withthe EU. It tookjust a fortnight for‘the six’ to set up ameeting on on theprinciple of 'equalaccess' to UK

fishing waters, andjust six hours before

UK entry talksactually started.The UK was

presented with afait accompli.

The UK fishing industry was stitched-up like a kipperin 1970, and the industry has never recovered since.

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How to break themould of repeated

exploitation“The existing tariffs imposed on goods such as processed coffee and

cocoa are high, which commentators, especially those in favour of reform,have argued prevents African farmers from competing on a level playing fieldwith their European counterparts. Brexit could mean that the UK becomes

free to negotiate better trade deals with African nations, without theobligation to consider the interests of other EU member states. This couldhave the consequential effect of boosting investment in and opportunities for

those working in the agricultural sector in Africa”

Amma Boakye, financial lawyer, Associate, Hogan Lovells, London

“Brexit is an opportunity for the UK to step up and support Africa so it can begin to feed its own people, refine its own oil, and process its

own cocoa and coffee, among other things” 217

Tina Blazquez-Lopez, financial lawyer, Pillsbury, London

While negotiating a post-Brexit deal, the UK’s representativesshould keep in mind that the British people voted for the

UK to be able to control immigration, set its own laws andregulations and escape the clutches of the European Court ofJustice. If the UK government concedes on these issues, it wouldnot only betray the people but also give up the chance of economicgain from Brexit 218.

A deal on the right terms would be preferable but no deal is better than abad deal.

Michael Burrage, director of Cimigo, a research institute in South East Asia,concludes that the UK does not need a deal to flourish. Leaving the EUwithout a deal and thereafter trading under WTO rules, would be an

acceptable option for the UK 219.

Ruth Lea, economic advisor at the Arbuthnot Banking Group, claims the UK’strade with non-EU countries, under a WTO regime, can thrive even in theabsence of preferential trade agreements. She emphasises that commercialfactors and growing markets are much more important than preferentialtrade agreements 220.

It is in the interests of Britain that it fully leaves the Customs Union in orderto go global and penetrate growing markets.

But it is also in the interest of the countries of Sub-Saharan Africa. Africaneeds not only an internal revolution to achieve inclusive economicprosperity but also a change in the external financial and trade environmentto overcome its history of exploitation by foreign actors like the EU.

Because of its inherently corporatist nature, the EU will continue to penaliseAfrica’s processing function by way of high tariffs and disadvantageous tradeagreements.

Abidjan, the capital of the Ivory Coast. Attaining a healthy economy in Africa, one thatbenefits everyone and not just the elites, will be good for both Africa and Europe

113

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Brexit represents an opportunity to break the mould of repeatedexploitation.

The UK is an important trading partner for manyAfrican nations. For example, more than one third ofcut flowers in the EU are imported from Kenya, withthe UK being the second largest buyer of theseflowers.

Outside the EU, the UK is able to strike ambitioustrade deals and pursue its own trade policy towardsAfrica. Brexit would enable the UK to make an end toexploitative policies and punitive tariffs and lead theway morally, as it did on ending the slave trade.

Max Jarrett, Director-in-charge of the Africa ProgressPanel’s Secretariat, says that Africa would embraceBrexit if the UK would rewrite the EPAs which heregards as the source of African economic exploitation.

“Britain has to enter trading relations with African countries that address issueswhich they feel are not just within the EPAs. If Britain were to do that, then I thinkmost Africans would cheer a Brexit Britain” 221.

The UK can effectively support Africa’s integration, industrialisation anddevelopment agenda by way of comprehensive and development-orientedfree trade agreements.

However, these agreements take time to negotiate. That is why the UK hasto elaborate a preferential system of access of African countries to the UKmarket as a transitional tool.

Maximiliano Mendez-Parra, trade economist and researcher with theOverseas Development Institute, proposes the UK designs a GeneralisedSystem of Preferences, including a general and a targeted regime 222.

The general regime would offer duty-free access for all those productswhere the MFN tariff is 5 per cent or less and a 50 per cent reduction induty on the rest of the products covered in this regime. The targeted regimewould give duty-free and quota-free access and include key agriculturalproducts (fruits, vegetables, coffee, tea, sugar, fish), textiles, clothing, footwear

Outside theEU, the UK isable to strikeambitious tradedeals and

pursue its owntrade policytowards Africa.

and light manufacturered products. These rules would allow the definitionof common rules of origin for all its beneficiaries, facilitating origincumulation.

The UK will only be able to forge a new relationship with African countriesif it fully leaves the Customs Union.

Brexit will enable the UK to offer to Africa what the EU has always refusedto give: a mutually beneficial trade relationship. Nothing more, nothing less.

The goal for the UK is a beneficial free trade environment - somethingwhich could also be said for many Sub-Saharan African countries.

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Notes1. Honor Mahony, ‘Barroso says EU is an‘empire’ ‘, EUObserver.com, 11 July 2007; BrunoWaterfield, ‘Barroso hails the European ‘empire’ ‘,The Daily Telegraph, 11 July 2007.

2. Mark Langan, Neocolonialism and thepoverty of development, Basingstoke: PalgraveMacmillan, 2017, p. 24.

3. The Treaty of Maastricht, signed on 7February 1992, changed the officialdenomination of the EEC and created aEuropean Union (EU), based on three pillars : asupranational pillar (the European Community(EC)), the Common Foreign and Security Policy(CFSP) and the police and judicial cooperation incriminal matters.

4. William Wilberforce, ‘On the horrors of theslave trade’, Speech in the House of Commons,12 May 1789.

5. Quoted by Adam Hochschild, ‘ ‘The slaveship’: when trade in human beings was lucrativeand respectable’, New York Times, 19 October2007.

6. Donald R. Wright, ‘Slavery in Africa’, Microsoft,Encarta, Online Encyclopedia, 2000.

7. Daron Acemoglu and James A. Robinson, ‘Whyis Africa poor?’, Economic History of DevelopingRegions, Vol. 25 (I), 2010, (21-50), p. 29.

8. ‘Western Africa. The beginnings of Europeanactivity’, Britannica.com.

9. Natasha L. Henry, ‘Slavery Abolition Act’,Encyclopedia Britannica.

10. Adekeye Adebajo, The curse of Berlin. Africaafter the Cold War, New York: ColumbiaUniversity Press, 2010, p. 13.

11. Quoted by Kevin C. Dunn, Imagining theCongo. The international relations of identity,Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan, 2003, p. 21.

12. Quoted by Adekeye Adebajo, op. cit., p. 16-17.

13. Matthew Craver, ‘Between law and history:the Berlin Conference of 1884-1885 and thelogic of free trade’, London Review ofInternational Law, Volume 3, Issue 1, 2015, (31-59), p. 38-40.

14. Keith Perry, Modern European history. Madesimple, London: Heinemann, 1976, p. 91.

15. General Act of the Berlin Conference onWest Africa, 26 February 1885.

16. Rudyard Kipling, ‘The White Man’s Burden:the United States and the Phillipine Islands’, TheNew York Sun, 10 February 1899.

17. Wikipedia, ‘The White Man’s Burden’.

18. History matters, ‘« The White Man’s Burden» : Kipling’s hymn to U.S. imperialism’.

19. ‘The philosophy of colonialism: Civilisation,Christianity, and Commerce’, in: Violence inTwentieth Century Africa.

20. ‘Colonialism in Africa’, World History inContext.

21. ‘Scramble for Africa’, New WorldEncyclopedia.

22. Robert Roswell Palmer & Joe Colton, Ahistory of the modern world, Third Edition, NewYork: Alfred A. Knopf, 1965, p. 619.

23. Robert Roswell Palmer & Joe Colton, op. cit.,p. 622.

24. Keith Perry, op. cit., p. 94.

25. William Easterly, The tyranny of experts.Economists, dictators and the forgotten rights ofthe poor, New York: Basic Books, 2013, p. 81-82,and p. 86-90.

26. Onwuka N. Njoku, ‘Royal Niger Company,1886-1898’.

27. Quoted by Talenda Gwaanbuka, ‘HowEurocentric boundaries of Africa have resulted ingenocide and political instability’, The AfricanExponent, 16 August 2017.

28. Alex Thomson, An introduction to Africanpolitics, Fourth Edition, London & New York:Routledge, 2016, p. 13.

29. Stelios Michalopoulos & Elias Papaioannou,‘The long-run effects of the Scramble for Africa’,Vox, 6 January 2012.

30. Paul Collier and Tony Venables, Trade andeconomic performance: Does Africa’sfragmentation matter?, Annual World BankConference on development economics, 2009, in:David A. Phillips, Development without aid. Thedecline of development aid and the rise of thediaspora, London-New York-New Delhi: AnthemPress, 2013, p. 74.

31. David A. Philips, op. cit., p. 74-75.

32. Alex Thomson, op. cit., p. 18.

33. Michael Ehis Odijie, EU trade systems andWest African ruling elites’ survival, PhD thesis,Date of deposited: 5 May 2017, University ofSheffield, p. 43.

34. ‘Economic underdevelopment in Africa’, in:Violence in Twentieth century Africa.

35. Alex Thomson, op. cit., p. 15.

36. Peo Hansen and Stefan Jonsson, ‘Anothercolonialism : Africa in the history of Europeanintegration’, Linköping University Post Print,2014, p. 6.

37. Richard Coudenhove-Kalergi, ‘Afrika’,Paneuropa, Vol. 5, N° 2, 1929, p. 2, quoted byPeo Hansen and Stefan Jonsson, Eurafrica. Theuntold history of European integration andcolonialism, London: Bloomsbury Publishing,2014, p. 28.

38. Peo Hansen and Stefan Jonsson, BringingAfrica as a ‘Dowry to Europe’: Europeanintegration and the Eurafrican project, 1920-1960, Linköping University Post Print, p. 10.

39. Peo Hansen and Stefan Jonsson, op. cit., p.13.

40. Vernon McKay, Africa in world politics, NewYork: Harper & Row, 1963, p. 139, quoted byPeo Hansen and Stefan Jonsson, op. cit., p. 18.

41. The Treaty of Rome or the Treaty

establishing the European Economic Communitywas signed on 25 March 1957 by Belgium,France, Italy, Luxembourg, the Netherlands andWest Germany, and came into force on 1January 1958.

42. Markus Gastinger, Europe’s colonial legacy -the missing link to understanding Europeanintegration?, Masterarbeit, Paris-LodronUniversität Salzburg, July 2009, p. 10-11.

43. P. Kenneth Kiplagat, ‘Fortress Europe andAfrica under the Lomé Convention: from policiesof paralysis to a dynamic response’, NorthCarolina Journal of International Law andCommercial Regulation, Vol. 18, N° 3, Summer1993, (589-632), p. 596; Markus Gastinger, op.cit., p. 26-28.

44. Peo Hansen and Stefan Jonsson, op. cit., p.4.

45. Michael Ehis Odijie, op. cit., p. 50.

46. Kwame Nkrumah, Neo-colonialism. The laststage of imperialism, New York: InternationalPublishers, 1965, p. ix, p. 1, and p. 19.

47. Reginald Herbold Green, ‘The child of Lomé:Messiah, Monster or Mouse’, (3-31), p. 5, in:Frank Long (Ed.),The political economy of EECrelations with African, Caribbean and Pacificstates, Oxford: Pergamon Press, 1980.

48. The first Yaoundé Convention was signed inthe city of Yaoundé, Cameroon, on 20 July 1963between the EEC and 18 African ex-colonies. Itentered into force on 1 June 1964. The secondYaoundé convention (1971-1975) was signed on29 July 1969 and entered into force on 1January 1971.

49. Michael Ehis Odijie, op. cit., p. 105.

50. Michael Ehis Odijie, op. cit., p. 81.

51. Michael Ehis Odijie, op. cit., p. 106.

52. Martin Meredith, The state of Africa. Ahistory of fifty years of independence, London:Free Press, 2006, p. 170-171.

53. Michael Ehis Odijie, op. cit., p. 107-108.

54. Martin Holland and Mathew Doidge,Development policy of the European Union,

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Hampshire: Palgrave Macmillan, 2012, p. 50.

55. Michael Ehis Odijie, op. cit., p. 112 and p.117.

56. Samuel Nana K.B. Asante, ’Pan-Africanismand regional integration’, in: Ali A. Mazrui (Ed.),International Scientific Committee for theDrafting of a General History of Africa, Africasince 1935. General history of Africa, VIII,UNESCO, Paris, 1993, p. 740.

57. The first Lomé Convention (1976-1981)was signed on 28 February 1975 and enteredinto force on 1 April 1976. Lomé II covered theperiod from January 1981 to February 1985;Lomé III came into force in March 1985 (trade)and May 1986 (aid). The trade provisions ofLomé IV covered the period 1990-1999.

58. Martin Holland and Mathew Doidge, op.cit., p. 57.

59. P. Kenneth Kiplagat, loc. cit., p. 605-606.

60. Mark Langan and Sophia Price,Extraversion and the West African EPADevelopment Programme: realising thedevelopment dimension of ACP-EU trade?, p. 25.

61. Michael Ehis Odijie, op. cit., p. 137.

62. Philipp Gieg, Great Game um Afrika?Europa, China und die USA auf dem schwarzenKontinent, Baden-Baden: NomosVerlagsgesellschaft, 2010, p. 86.

63. Michael Ehis Odijie, op. cit., p. 138-144.

64. Ian Taylor, Bait and switch: the EuropeanUnion’s incoherence towards Africa, The JeanMonnet papers on political economy, Universityof the Peloponnese, 12/2015, (1-21), p. 8.

65. Translation of “Elf n’est pas seulement unesociété pétrolière, c’est une diplomatie parallèledestinée à garder le contrôle sure un certainnombre d’Etats africains, surtout au moment cléde la décolonisation (...) il s’agit également d’unprolongement de l’Etat, afin que la politiqueafricaine soit bien conforme aux intérêts dupays. Disons que le président d’Elf est à la foisprésident d’une société pétrolière et ministre bisde la coopération. Et c’est justement parce que

cette société avait un objet politique etdiplomatique en Afrique qu’elle a de tout tempsfinancé les services secrets » (Loïk Le Foch-Prigent, Affaire Elf, affaire d’Etat, Entretriens avecEric Ecouty, Le cherche-midi, 2001).

66. Quoted by Antoine Roger Lokongo, ‘Africannations can no longer afford to be France’sgarden’, Global Times, 22 October 2012.

67. Lisapo ya Kama, ‘Qu’est-ce que laFrançafrique?, Histoire Africaine, 8 January2017.

68. ‘Foccart, l’initiateur de la “Françafrique” ‘, LesEchos.fr, 10 August 2009.

69. The term ‘Françafrique’ was first used byPresident Félix Houphouet-Boigny of Ivory Coast,in allusion to that country’s economic growthand political stability under its alliance withFrance. However, the term is now often used tocriticise the relationship France has with itsformer colonies.

70. Wikipedia, ‘Jacques Foccart’.

71. Hector Igbikiowubo, ‘Elf executives jailedover fuelling corruption in Africa’, Global Policy,18 November 2003; also: Hugh Schofield, ‘Elftrial reveals moral vacuum’, BBCNews, 24 April2003.

72. Nicolas Beau, ‘Congo-Brazzaville, Totalassure les fins de mois du régime’, Mondafrique,4 February 2018.

73. Quoted by Martin Meredith, op. cit., p. 228.

74. Mirjam Prenger, ‘Kannibaal die Napoleonvan Afrika wilde zijn’, De Volkskrant, 5 November1986.

75. Asfa-Wossen Asserate, ‘If Germany reallywants to help Africa ...’, DeutscheWelle.com, 11September 2017.

76. Dambisa Moyo, Dead aid. Why aid is notworking and how there is another way for Africa,London & New York: Allen Lane, 2009, p. 116.

77. Leaked email, cited in Sunday Times(London), 11 December 2005, quoted by IanTaylor, loc. cit., p. 9.

78. Angelos Sepos, ‘Imperial power Europe? The

EU’s relations with the ACP countries’, Journal ofPolitical Power, 2013, Vol. 6, N° 2, (261-287), p.269.

79. Josef Martin Razinger, Die Agrarpolitik derEU. Auswirkungen auf Entwicklungsländer inAfrika, Master’s thesis, Universität Wien, 2014, p.11.

80. Emmet Livingstone, Maïa de la Baume andDavid M. Herszenhorn, ‘Who dares touchFrance’s sacred cow?, Politico, 11 January 2018.

81. Simon Marks, ‘European farmers’ SOS (Saveour Subsidies), Politico.eu, 18 December 2016.

82. Mark Langan and Sophia Price, op. cit., p.13.

83. Nicolai Kwasniewski, ‘Ein Geschenk für dieGeschlagenen’, Der Spiegel, 17 January 2014.

84. Matthias Krupa and Caterina Lobenstein,‘Ein Mann pflückt gegen Europa. Wie Tomatenaus der EU afrikanische Bauern zu Flüchtlingenmachen‘, ZeitOnline, 30 December 2015.

85. Alice Katherine Schmidt, Impact of theUnited States’ and the European Union’sagricultural subsidies on African countries,Master’s thesis, Goethe Universität, Frankfurt amMain, 2016, p. 26.

86. Ian Gillson, Colin Poulton, Kelvin Balcombe,and Sheila Page, Overseas DevelopmentInstitute, ‘Understanding the impact of cottonsubsidies on developing countries’, WorkingPaper, May 2004, p. 31 and p. 34.

87. Alice Katherine Schmidt, op. cit., p. 30.

88. Emmet Livingstone, ‘How EU milk is sinkingAfrica’s farmers‘, Politico, 12-18 April 2018.

89. Jozef Martin Razinger, op. cit., p. 83; JuttaWasserrab, ‘Subventioniert Europa weltweitenHunger?’, DeutscheWelle.com, 23 November2011.

90. Okechukwu C. Iheduru, ‘The politicaleconomy of Euro-African fishing agreements’, TheJournal of Developing Areas, Vol. 30, N° 1,October 1995, (63-90), p. 64.

91. Christian Lequesne, The politics of fisheriesin the European Union, Manchester: Manchester

University Press, 2004, p. 91.

92. Anthony Acheampong, ‘Coherence betweenEU fisheries agreements and EU developmentcooperation: the case of West Africa’, ECDPMWorking Paper, N° 52, December 1997, (1-26),p. 4-5.

93. Elsa Hannah Maria Günther, EU und Afrika- Die Ursachen und Folgen des Niedergangs inWestafrika, Frankfurt am Main: Peter Lang,2011, p. 31.

94. George Kent, ‘Fisheries policies in the SouthPacific’, in Ocean Yearbook 2, ed. Elisabeth M.Borgese and Norton Ginsberg (Chicago, IL:University of Chicago Press, 1980), p. 363,quoted by Okechukwu C. Iheduru, loc. cit., p. 65-66.

95. Okechukwu C. Iheduru, loc. cit., p. 73.

96. Vlad M. Kaczynski and Daniel L. Fluharty,‘European policies in West Africa: who benefitsfrom fisheries agreements?’, Marine Policy 26,2002, (75-93), p. 89.

97. Frédéric Le Manach, MialyAndriamahefazafy, Sarah Harper, AlasdairHarris, Gilles Hosch, Glenn-Marie Lange, DirkZeller, Ussif Rashid Sumaila, ‘Who gets what ?Developing a more equitable framework for EUfishing agreements‘, Marine Policy 38, 2013,(257-266), p. 262.

98. Quoted by Julia Simmerling, ‘Robbing thepoor to feed the rich’, Environmental Ethics andPolicy, 6 September 2013.

99. Frédéric Le Manach, Christian Chaboud,Duncan Copeland, Philippe Cury, Didier Gascuel,Kristin M. Kleisner, André Standing, U. RashidSumaila, Dirk Zeller and Daniel Pauly, ‘EuropeanUnion’s public fishing access agreements indeveloping countries’, PLOS ONE, November2013, Volume 8, Issue 11, (1-10), p. 1 and p. 5-6.

100. IFREMER, Study : evaluation of thefisheries agreements concluded by the EuropeanCommunity, Summary report, August 1999, p. 8,p. 10-11, p. 15-19, and p. 22.

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101. Coalition for Fair Fisheries Agreements, Thebattle for fish conference, Brussels, 1992, p. 4,quoted by Okechukwu C. Iheduru, loc. cit., p. 75.

102. Matthias Mundt, ‘The effects of EUFisheries Partnership Agreements on fish stocksand fishermen: the case of Cape Verde’, WorkingPaper, N° 12/2012, Institute for InternationalPolitical Economy Berlin, p. 14-15.

103. Quoted by Okechukwu C. Iheduru, loc. cit.,p. 81.

104. Matthias Mundt, loc. cit., p. 18-19.

105. European Court of Auditors, Special ReportN° 3/2001 concerning the Commission’smanagement of the international fisheriesagreements, together with the Commission’sreplies, OJ, 27/07/2001, C 210/9.

106. Nikolaj Nielsen, ‘Study : EU-accreditedships plundering African fish’, EUObserver.com,11 October 2002.

107. André Standing, ‘Corruption and industrialfishing in Africa’, U4Issue, 2008:7, (1-29), p. 15.

108. Duncan Copeland, ‘West Africa : illegalfishing hits West Africa’s stocks’, AllAfrica.com, 5February 2014.

109. André Standing, ‘Corruption andcommercial fisheries in Africa’, U4.no, December2008, N° 23, (1-4), p. 3.

110. Thomas Binet, Fishing for coherence inWest Africa. Policy coherence in the fisheriessector in seven West African countries, OECD,2008, p. 70.

111. Hannah M. Cross, ‘The EU migrationregime and West African clandestine migrants’,Journal of Contemporary European Research, 5,2009, (171-187), p. 183.

112. ‘In Senegal, some fisherman resist lure ofEurope migration’, New York Times, 23 July2015.

113. Pierre Failler and Thomas Binet, ‘A criticalreview of the European Union-West Africanfisheries agreements’, (166-170), p. 166, in:Pierre Jacquet, Rajendra K. Pachauri andLaurence Tubiana (Eds.), Oceans: the new

frontier, New Delhi: Teri Press, 2011.

114. Alan Hudson, Case study: the fisheriespartnership agreements.

115. European Court of Auditors, Are thefisheries partnership agreements well managedby the Commission?, Special Report N°11/2015, p. 33-35.

116. Emma Witbooi, Fisheries and sustainability.A legal analysis of EU and West Africanagreements, Leiden/Boston : Martinus NijhoffPublishers, 2012, p. 136-137; Elsa HannahMaria Günther, op. cit., p. 42.

117. Philipp Nagel and Tim Gray, ‘Is the EU’sFisheries Partnership Agreement (FPA) withMauritania a genuine partnership or exploitationby the EU’, Ocean & Coastal Management,February 2012, Vol. 56, (26-34).

118. Africa Progress Panel, Grain, fish andmoney. Africa Progress Report 2014, p. 89.

119. Quoted by Dario Sarmadi, ‘EU-Africa freetrade agreement ‘destroys’ development, saysMerkel advisor’, Euractiv.de, 7 November 2014.

120. Quoted by Alan Beattle and AndrewBounds, ‘How Europe’s trade talks with poorformer colonies became mired in distrust’,Financial Times, 12 December 2007.

121. Partnership Agreement between themembers of the ACP grouping, on the one hand,and the EC and its member states, on the otherhand. This agreement was signed in Cotonou on23 June 2000 to replace the Lomé Convention,and is due to expire in 2020.

122. Article 36 of the Cotonou Agreement.

123. Mark Langan (2016), op. cit., p. 2.

124. Mayur Platel, Economic PartnershipAgreements between the EU and Africancountries: potential development implications forGhana, Oxford: Realising Rights, p. 18, in: MarkLangan and Sophia Price, loc. cit., p. 12-13.

125. L. Hinkle, M. Hoppe and R. Neufarmer,Beyond Cotonou: Economic PartnershipAgreements in Africa, in: R. Neufarmer (Ed.),Trade, Doha and development: window into the

issues, Washington, DC: World Bank, 267-280; C.Stevens and J. Kennan, EU-ACP EconomicPartnership Agreements: the impact ofreciprocity, Brighton: Institute for DevelopmentStudies, 2005, in: Mark Langan, ‘Budget supportand Africa-European Union relations: free marketreform and neo-colonialism?, European Journal ofInternational Relations, 2015, Vol. 21, (101-121),p. 109.

126. Fredrick Njehu, ‘Manoeuvering at themargins of an EPA deadlock: will the EAC bowdown to EU pressure?’, GREAT insights, Volume3, Issue 9, October/November 2014.

127. Michael Ehis Odijie, op. cit., p. 179.

128. Ivan R. Mugisha, ‘UN body warns regionagainst signing trade deal with the EU’, The EastAfrican, 22 April 2017.

129. Mark Langan and Sophia Price, loc. cit., p.16.

130. Michael Ehis Odijie, op. cit., p. 196-205.

131. Julius Nyerere, The Arusha Declaration, 5February 1967, quoted by Annalisa Furia, Theforeign aid regime: gift-giving, states and globaldis/order, Hampshire: Palgrave Macmillan, 2015,p. 75.

132. Tim Murithi, ‘Aid colonisation and thepromise of African continental integration’, in :Hakima Abbas and Yves Niyirgira (Eds.),Redeemer or coloniser?, Cape Town, Dakar,Nairobi and Oxford: Pambazuka Press, 2009, (1-12), p. 3, and p. 5-6.

133. Martin Holland and Mathew Doidge, op.cit., p. 60-61.

134. Mark Langan, The moral economy of EUassociation with Africa, London & New York:Routledge, 2016, p. 38-39.

135. European Court of Auditors, The EuropeanDevelopment Fund (EDF) contribution to asustainable road network in Sub-Saharan Africa,Special Report N° 17, December 2012, p.5.

136 Sam Stewart Mutabazi, ‘The genesis ofKampala Northern Bypass; was the projectjinxed at inception?’, URSSI, 17 December 2017.

137. Kwame Nkrumah, op. cit., p. x and p. xv.

138. Stephen R. Hurt, ‘African agency in worldtrade undermined? The case of bilateral relationswith the European Union’, (49-64), p. 61, in:William Brown and Sophie Harman (Eds.),African agency in international politics, London &New York: Routledge, 2013; Gerrit Oliver, ‘Fromcolonialism to partnership in Africa-Europerelations?, The International Spectator, Vol. 46, N°1, March 2011, (53-67), p. 61.

139. Action Aid, CAFOD, Christian Aid, Tearfund,Traidcraft, Partnership under pressure : anassessment of the European Commission’sconduct in the EPA negotiations, 2008, p. 18-20.

140. Paul Goodison, ‘The future of Africa’s tradewith Europe : ‘New’ EU trade policy’, Review ofAfrican Political Economy, Vol. 34, N° 111, 2007,(139-151), p. 147-148, in: Dirk Kohnert, ‘EU-African economic relations: continuing dominancetraded for aid?, GIGA Working Papers, N° 82,July 2008, p. 13.

141. Mark Langan (2015), loc. cit., p. 108-109,and p. 114-115.

142. European Commission, EconomicPartnership Agreements: questions and answers,11 September 2007.

143. Quoted by John Namkwahe and ZephaniaUbwani, ‘Tanzania backs out of EAC deal withEU over Brexit’, Daily Nation, 9 July 2016.

144. Quoted by Jimoh Babatunde & FranklinAlli, ‘EPA: 8.94 billion dollars developmentpackage tears ECOWAS apart’, Vanguard, 4January 2016.

145. Dominic Omondi, ‘Kenya in last-ditch effortto persuade Tanzania to sign EPA’, The Standard,27 September 2017.

146. Quoted by Dorothy Nakaweesi & IsmailMusa Ladu, ‘Is the collapse of the EconomicPartnership Agreement looming?’, Daily Monitor,1 February 2017.

147. Maryanne Gicobi, ‘European Union woosTanzania to sign trade deal’, The East African, 13May 2017.

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148. Rosa Crawford, ‘Tanzania & Uganda standup against unfair EU-East Africa trade deal’,TUC, 7 September 2017.

149. Rick Rowden, ‘Why African countries arerefusing trade pacts’, The Herald, 9 September2016.

150. Michael Ehis Odijie, op. cit., p. 190.

151. Calestous Juma, ‘How the EU starvesAfrica into submission’, CapX, 26 October 2015.

152. Report from Mighty Earth, 13 September2017, in: PHYSORG, ‘Chocolate industry drivingdeforestation of Ivory Coast’, 13 September2017.

153 ‘World’s biggest chocolate manufacturersdriving rampant deforestation in Ivory Coast’, 15September 2017.

154. Victoria Crandall, ‘The challenges facingWest Africa’s chocolate industry’, How we madeit in Africa, 25 September 2017.

155. Julia Thiemann, ‘Germany a coffee giantwithout growing a single bean’,Independentaustralia.com, 17 July 2012.

156. Kevin Dowd, ‘A trade policy for a BrexitedBritain’, IEA Discussion Paper, N° 85, August2017, p. 17.

157. Roman Grynberg, ‘African coffee isn’tworth a bean’, Mail & Guardian, 10 May 2013.

158. ‘Biofuels drive land grabs, EU energyministers warned’, Friends of the Earth Europe,21 February 2013.

159. Alison Graham, Sylvain Aubry, RolfKünneman and Sofia Monsalve Suarez, The roleof the EU in land grabbing in Africa - CSOMonitoring 2009-2010 “Advanced AfricanAgriculture” (AAA): The impact of Europe’spolicies and practices on African agriculture andfood security, p. 1.

160. Friends of the Earth Africa and Friends ofthe Earth Europe, Africa up for grabs. The scaleand impact of land grabbing for agrofuels, 2010,p. 8.

161. Directive 2009/28/EC of 23 April 2009on the promotion of the use of energy from

renewable sources, OJ L 140, 5 June 2009, p.16-62.

162. Grain, Land grabbing for biofuels muststop, 21 February 2013.

163. Directorate-General for External Policies ofthe European Parliament, Land grabbing andhuman rights: the involvement of Europeancorporate and financial entities in land grabbingoutside the European Union, 2016, p. 29, and p.30-31.

164. Friends of the Earth Africa and Friends ofthe Earth Europe, op. cit., p. 12, and p. 29-33.

165. William Todts, ‘Europe’s love affair withbiofuels is on the rocks’, Transport andEnvironment, 6 April 2017.

166. Quoted by Sam Jones, ‘EU’s bank’s allegedlack of transparency ‘like something out of a LeCarré novel’ ‘, The Guardian, 18 March 2015.

167. European Investment Bank, ‘Tailoredfunding and complementary partnerships. 10years of the ACP Investment Facility’.

168. ‘An invisible bank in Luxembourg’, TheEuropean Investment Bank: Africa’s discreetfinancier, 2 June 2017.

169. Laurence Soustras, Riana RaymondeRandrianarisova, ‘A tale of reverse development’,The European Investment Bank: Africa’s discreetfinancier, 16 June 2017.

170. Mark Langan and James Scott, ‘The falsepromise of Aid for Trade’, BWPI Working Paper160, University of Manchester, December 2011,(1-32), p. 20.

171. Adriana Homolova, Laurence Soustras andDavid Santiago Tarazona Patarroyo, ‘Investigation:the discreet banker of Africa development’,EUobserver.com, 2 June 2017.

172. Sam Jones, ‘European Investment Bankaccused of suppressing Zambian mining report’,The Guardian, 3 April 2014; FinancialTransparency Coalition, ‘EU development fundsdoing more harm than good: EIB supportscompany that dodges taxes in Zambia’, 11 April2011.

173. Quoted by Peter Fabricius, ‘African leaderstake the blame for the continent’s resourcecurse’, Institute for Security Studies, 18 May2017.

174. Quoted by Kieron Monks, ‘Why the wealthof Africa does not make Africans wealthy’,edition.ccn.com, 22 April 2016.

175. Africa Progress Panel (2013), op. cit., p. 45.

176. Interview with Dr. Asfa-Wossen Asserate,in: Ruth Renée Reif, ‘Eine andere Afrika-Politikwäre die grösste Hilfe‘, Neue Zürcher Zeitung,17 January 2017.

177. Interview with Volker Seitz, ‘Wir haben dasGute mit guter Absicht verwechselt’, ARD.de, 12April 2010.

178. Elizabeth Blunt, ‘Corruption costs Africabillions’, BBC News, 18 September 2002.

179. Barney Warf, ‘Geographies of Africancorruption’, PSU Research Review, Vol. 1, Issue:1,2017, (20-38).

180. Paul Collier, The bottom billion, Oxford:Oxford University Press, 2008, p. 38-49.

181. Rupert Neate, ‘African invoice fraudhampers development of poorest nations’, TheGuardian, 11 May 2014.

182. Directorate-General for External Policies ofthe European Parliament, Tax revenuemobilisation in developing countries: issues andchallenges, Study for DEVE, April 2014, p. 16-17;‘Show us the money’, The Economist, 1-7September 2012.

183. Africa Progress Panel (2013), op. cit., p. 25.

184. Human Rights Watch, World Report 2018- Equatorial Guinea : events of 2017, 18 January2018.

185. Global Witness, ‘Le FMI doit s’assurer quele régime kleptocrate de la République du Congone bénéficie pas d’un nouveau traitement defaveur‘, 29 November 2017.

186. Sylavin Vidzraku, ‘Congo: l’administrationpublique gangrenée par la corruption‘,Afrique.latribune.fr, 27 December 2017.

187. Ngouela Ngoussou, ‘La société civiledénonce la corruption au Congo-Brazzaville‘,www.voaafrique.com , 19 January 2018.

188. ‘Corruption au Congo-Brazzaville: lenégociant-suisse Gunvor épinglé‘, TV5Monde, 12September 2017.

189. Thierry Carlier, ‘Congo president’s daughtercharged with corruption in France‘,www.france24.com, 25 June 2017.

190. Africa Progress Panel, op. cit., p. 56.

191. Beatrice Materu, ‘Tanzania’s mining firmshave three months to comply with law‘,AllAfrica.com, 23 January 2018; KatharineHoureld and Zandi Shabalala, ‘Investors wary asTanzania moves to assert more control overmines’, Reuters.com, 25 September 2017.

192. ‘Tanzania’s president signs new mining billsinto law’, Reuters.com, 10 July 2017.

193. ‘Tanzania’s new mining rules imposerestrictions on foreign banks, insurers‘,Reuters.com, 20 February 2018.

194. ‘Congo’s Kabila signs into law mining code‘,www.miningweekly.com , 12 March 2018.

195. Dan Paget, ‘Tanzania: Magufuli’s miningreforms are a masterclass in politicalmanoeuvring‘, African Arguments, 17 July 2017.

196. Quoted by Daniel Pelz, ’Africa’sgovernments put pressure on mining groups‘,Deutsche Welle.com, 19 August 2017.

197. Amir Shafaie, Jean-Pierre Okenda andThomas Lassourd, ‘The Democratic Republic ofCongo deserves a better mining law‘, FinancialTimes, 6 February 2018.

198. ‘Tanzanian opposition MP jailed for fivemonths for insulting president’, Reuters.com, 26February 2018.

199. ‘Tanzanian opposition leader is chargedwith rebellion‘, Associated Press, 28 March 2018.

200. Interview with Asfa-Wossen Asserate, in:Jochen Hieber, ‘Afrikas Hoffnung verlässt denKontinent‘, Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung, 18July 2015.

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201. Delali Adogla-Bessa, ‘Ghanaians among topforeigners boosting UK health system’,Citifmonline.com, 22 August 2017.

202. David Signer, ‘Eine BankrotterklärungAfrikas’, Neue Zürcher Zeitung, 27 January2015.

203. UNCTAD, ‘UNCTAD warns on debt: Africashould find new ways to finance development’,21 July 2016.

204. William Easterly, The white man’s burden.Why the West’s efforts to aid the rest have doneso much ill and so little good, New York: PenguinBooks, 2006, p. 7.

205. Quoted by Nicholas Norbrook, ‘ ‘Where isthe brain surgery in making chocolate?’, AfDBpresident Akinwumi Adesina on Africa’s need fora farming revolution’, The Africa Report, 18January 2018.

206. Michela Wrong, ‘ ‘The looting machine’, byTom Burgis’, Sunday book review, The New YorkTimes, 20 March 2015.

207. Daron Acemoglu and James A. Robinson,Why nations fail: the origins of power, prosperity,and poverty, New York: Crown Publishers, 2012,p. 76-82.

208. Juliet Samuel, ‘Penalising Britain will nothelp the EU to promote unity among the 27‘,The Daily Telegraph, 3 April 2017.

209. Hans-Werner Sinn, ‘Die Bedeutung desBrexit für Deutschland und Europa‘, FrankfurterAllgemeine Zeitung, 16 March 2017.

210. Oliver Patel and Christine Reh, ‘Brexit: theconsequences for the EU’s political system’, UCLConstitution Unit Briefing paper, p. 4-5.

211. Hans-Werner Sinn, ‘Bloss die Briten nichtabstrafen’, Handelsblatt, 8 February 2017; Hans-Werner Sinn, ‘Why the EU must be generous to

the UK over Brexit’, The Guardian, 31 January2017.

212. European Council, Guidelines for the futureEU-UK relationship, 23 March 2018.

213. Christian Lequesne, op. cit., p. 20.

214. Christopher Booker and Richard North,The Great Deception. A secret history of theEuropean Union, London/New York: Continuum,2003, p. 146.

215. Daniel Boffey, ‘Denmark to contest UKefforts to ‘take back control’ of fisheries’, TheGuardian, 18 April 2017.

216. Paragraph 8, point i, second sentence ofthe European Council guidelines.

217. Amma Boakye, ‘The effects of Brexit ontrade in Africa’, Without Prejudice, September2016; Didi Akinyelure, 'Brexit's bitter-sweetmeaning for chocolate lovers and Ivory Coast',BBC News, 1 December 2016.

218. Roger Bootle, ‘Britain needs a Singaporesling into the post-EU era‘, The Daily Telegraph, 3July 2016.

219. Michael Burrage, It’s quiet ok to walkaway. A review of the UK’s Brexit options withthe help of seven international databases,London: Institute for the Study of Civil Society,April 2017.

220. Ruth Lea, ‘Post-Brexit trade can thriveunder WTO rules’, LSE Brexit, 27 January 2017.

221. Quoted by Jake Davies, ‘Africa prepares fornew relationship with post-Brexit Britain’,Deutsche Welle, 6 October 2017.

222. Maximiliano Mendez-Parra, ‘Designing anew UK preferences regime post-Brexit’, WorkingPaper 521, Overseas Development Institute,September 2017, (1-24), p. 22-23.

The press articles, mentioned in the Notes (pages 114-122), are not included in the bibliography.

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Acknowledgements

This booklet could not have been produced without the invaluable help of our EFDD colleague, Rob Burberry.

Photographs maps, charts and diagrams in this book are from the authors, or licensed from commercial photographiclibraries or are public-domain images from Wikipedia Commons,

or generated by the authors or designer.