Frances’s major military base in Cote d’Ivoire is billed to close down at the end of this month. The long -standing base, Port Bouet, is to be rid of its French troop occupants and is to be renamed General Quattara Thomas d’Aquinn base after an indigenous military figure. No one knows whether the French were pushed or are voluntarily fleeing. The latter possibility makes more sense in the context of recent developments in relations between Paris and its many West African client states.
Prior to now, the string of French speaking West African countries : Mali, Guinea, Burkina Faso, Niger and Chad- had severed military and even diplomatic links with France. It is the culmination of lingering colonial economic encumbrances and France’s own domestic political and economic contradictions.
In the aftermath of these departures, a vortex of diplomatic and strategic waves have been unleashed. Jihadist military pressure from the northern parts of the Sahel have increased , leading to avoidable mounting casualties especially in Burkina Faso. Domestic political pressure has increased the demand for democratic rule as defined by new economic hardships occasioned by the bungling of the presiding military authorities. New national security arrangements masterminded by an increased presence of Russian troops in the region have crept in as well. New economic and diplomatic imperatives have been inaugurated as the military regimes struggle to adapt to new diplomatic and international realities.
Initially, the impulse of non-French West African countries led by Nigeria was to impose sanctions on the countries that fell under military coups. The UN concurred as a reflex. Threats to air links and border closures however did little to discourage the new military juntas. The willingness of black markets and other rogue financial arrangements insulated the new military regimes from the more adverse effects of regional sanctions.
One of the far reaching responses of the more daring military regimes has been to threaten the cohesion of ECOWAS, the regional economic integration bloc. An initial threat by ECOWAS to use military force to enforce compliance collapsed due to an obvious lack of military capacity and the cash poverty of most of the bloc’s member countries. In the intervening period, the military juntas have waxed stronger and become more a daring hreat to the survival of ECOWAS itself.
At the present moment, the three leading states-Mali, Niger and Burkina Faso have threatened to pull their countries out of ECOWAS. It is not just a threat but one backed by a deadline of end of January 2025. Nothing has happened so far that indicates a determination to save the 50-year old regional bloc.
Many argue that there is little or nothing in the achievements of ECOWAS that deserves to be saved. West African economies have hardly grown, leaving little or nothing to integrate. The free movement of persons in and across the region has mostly translated into the freedom of impoverished “others” to travel into and out of Nigeria in search of opportunities that are hardly there. Otherwise, the free movement of persons has meant the free movement of jihadist insurgents and their black market arms or the migration of scraggy livestock across badly manned borders
For Nigeria, the near total evacuation of French military, diplomatic and economic presence from West Africa poses huge foreign policy challenges. First, the imminent loss of ECOWAS is a major historical setback. Our clout as a regional leader is on its way home. The gains made in the days of ECOMOG and the restoration of peace and democracy in Liberia and Sierra Leone are about to be consigned to the dustbin of history. It must concern Presdient Tinubu that this historic diplomatic setback will be happening under his watch as President of Nigeria.
At a time when the interest of major Western powers in Africa has been in decline for years, Nigeria stands the risk of being the remaining major Western ally in a region of global economic interest but now beset with strategic security threats of a global scope.
The Gulf of Guinea corridor linking Angola to Brazil in the Atlantic remains a zone of great importance and interest both for global maritime traffic and oil and gas energy security.
Nigeria’s geographical location places us in direct line of fire of the rampaging jihadist insurgency in the north. We share a common extensive border stretch with major theatres of jihadist threat: Niger, Chad with proximal reach with Burkina Faso and the others.
The departure of the French from these countries means that Nigeria’s northern border is now open to direct jihadist presence and influence. We have this proximity to hold responsible for our decades long incessant insecurity from movements like Boko Haram, ISWAP and other fringe fundamentalist groups of diverse names and iterations mostly inspired by Al Queda, ISIS and their other successor groups.
Nigeria’s geo-cultural configuration with a dominantly northern Moslem and southern Christian population reinforces the strategic security threat of the present situation. Yet the reality of the situation is one in which two major threats to global security lie at the doorsteps of Nigeria. Beside the well known jihadist threat from the Sahel, it is significant to note that in all the countries from which the French have recently exited and the military have taken over power, the civil populace have been manipulated into waving Russian flags in the streets while jubilating to welcome military coup leaders. As recently as the late 2024 hunger protests in Nigeria, some youth were arrested for brandishing Russian flags in the streets of Kano!
The presence of Russian troops and political interest groups was heightened in the days of the Yevgeny Prikozym and his Wagner Group of mercenaries in West and Central Africa. Wagner was a combined economic extraction and military venture. African countries were offered security assistance in return for contracts and mining rights . Over time, Wagner became an extension of Moscow’s territorial interst in Africa. Declining Western interest in parts of Africa attracted the attention of an ambitious Vladimir Putin whose escapades in Europe have been blocked in Ukraine. The attraction to Putin was heightened by the declining capacity of African military forces to protect their countries from Sahelian jihadist forces armed and funded from international terrorist sources.
Effectively then, with the departure of the French from a country as close as Niger, Nigeria now has at its immediate northern border two unfriendly influences with active forces: Islamic jihadist ISIS affiliates and Russian occupation forces.
In recent weeks, the military government in Niger has accused Nigeria of plotting to overthrow it. This has partly prompted recent debates as to whether Nigeria should host Western military presence in its northern states is redundant. What we have at stake in Niger is both a national territorial integrity issue and a global sphere of influence contest. Both pressures are essentially and urgently military before they are diplomatic in nature. A nation must be capable of effectively protecting and defending its territorial integrity in military terms. In concert with larger interests, a nation located along a sphere of influence fault line must also be capable of collaborating with other interested parties to house an effective base for the defense of the sphere of influence. This is the effective backdrop for making sense of the foreign military base debate among Nigerian politicians.
Unfortunately, contributions to this debate from our professional military have been less than informed. It is hard for the current military establishment to argue against foreign military bases. Our professional military establishment has failed woefully to assure both Nigerians and the world that it has the capacity and integrity to protect and defend Nigeria from the twin forces of jihadist terrorism and insurgency let alone guaranteeing a hemispheric sphere of influence contest.
In the coming months, it is a season of goings and comings in Nigeria’s immediate international relations. Our domestic political challenges may be somewhat diminished by headaches from the immediate neighbourhood.
