PERSPECTIVES

Have US Priorities in Africa Changed?

Do Security Concerns Trump Others?

ft

S teve M cD onald has over 40 years o f experience in international affairs, pri

marily focused on Africa. He served as the Director of the Africa Program at

the Woodrow Wilson Center from 2010 to 2013.
t th e end o f th e firs t ever US-Africa Leaders
Sum m it on August 7, 2014, President Obama
declared th a t it had been an "e xtra o rd in a ry
e ven t," c itin g th e a c c o m p lis h m e n ts o f th e
s u m m it in te rm s o f trad e, in ve stm e n t, and
security cooperation. Included in the latter category was
a co m m itm e nt to peacekeeping and the need to address
corruption and bad governance in the continent.
Had the sum m it broken new ground in terms o f US policy
and priorities? If the answer was"no,"then w hat did the status
quo mean? More o f the same was more o f what?
Prior to the sum m it and Obama's August 2013 trip to
Africa, US policy on Africa had been most succinctly outlined
on June 14,2012, when President Obama signed a Presidential
Policy Directive (PPD) on Sub-Saharan Africa meant to clarify
new directions under his administration.The PPD was a policy
d ocu m e nt th a t had fo u r core com ponents and strategic
priorities: strengthening dem ocratic institutions; spurring
economic grow th, trade, and investment; advancing peace
and security; and prom oting o p p o rtu n ity and developm ent.
Most know ledgeable observers stifled a yawn. These
were the same four pillars p ut forward in 2008 by the first
Obama candidacy, and had been the ruling doctrine inform
ing African policy since then. In fact, there was very little

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change in the broad outline o f policy since the Clinton and

Bush adm inistrations. These were principles around which
all Americans could agree on and around which a bipartisan
coalition could be built between and w ithin Congress and the
Obama adm inistration. It was a b it like the old adage where
"m other and apple pie" are the policy, and w ho can say "no"
to that? We all w ant dem ocratic institutions, peace, security,
opportunity, developm ent, and economic grow th for Africa.
While support in all o f these "core com ponents" is war
ranted and should continue to be given, the questions we
need to ask ourselves are where are US strategic interests best
served, w hat really matters to the United States, and where
can we really have an impact, for us and for Africa? Are these
ideals responding to Africa's needs? Are they the"right"ones?
The focus on trade and investm ent at the sum m it and in
earlier policy pronouncem ents is understandable; b ut there
are security issues linked to international terrorism th a t need
to be addressed as well, along w ith emerging democracies
th a t need to be strengthened, infrastructure th a t needs to
be built, and conflicts and hum anitarian crises th a t need to
be addressed.
Isthe US policy com m unity asking itself these questions?
Can these policy streams be kept in balance and are these the
directions th a t the United States seems to be taking?

Photos Courtesy Reuters

PERSPECTIVES
W h ith e r D e m o cra cy in Africa?
Africa has always had an econom ic potential that should
have made it im p orta nt to the United States no m atter w hat
angle was considered: economic, political, or security. The
inh ibiting factors for a vibrant economic relationship in past
years were conflict and corrupt governance in Africa. While
high profile conflicts still exist in the Central African Republic,
Somalia, South Sudan, Mali, and the Eastern Democratic Re
public o f Congo, the era o f constant conflict and instability is
gone. However, the grow th o f democracy in Africa has been
a slow process. The first 30 years or so o f "independence" in
Africa, from roughly 1958 to 1990, showed few tendencies
towards dem ocracy as the West w ould define it. Sure, the
West paid lip service to p ro m o tin g dem ocracy, b u t even
Africans made few pretenses that they shared th a t goal. One
needs to look no fu rth e r than at the Organization o f African
U nity (OAU), founded in 1963, which carried in its charter a
sacrosanct codicil th a t no African country could broach the
sovereignty o f another, for whatever reason, including o p
pression and massacre o f th e ir citizens. It was, therefore, not
ju s t th a t internal politics, the succession o f leadership, and
the sharing o f the perks o f power were not m onitored, but
the trea tm en t o f people, however brutal, was considered
the sovereign responsibility o f the country, and not th a t of
its neighbors.
One can take little com fort in the history o f democracy
in Africa prior to 1990. There was no "culture" o f democracy,
as some scholars call it. But, dramatic things were about to
happen. Long before Egypt, Tunisia, and Libya felt it, an "Africa
Spring" swept the continent in the 1990s. When the Berlin
Wall came dow n, the international support th a t existed for
any leader w ho was w illing to sell his loyalty for a price began
to disappear. No longer did Cold War allegiances dictate the
developm ent and economic policies o f the m ajor powers.
The stirrings o f democratic trends began to be apparent early
on. South Africa had already shown signs o f the m onolith
breaking, as it helped broker the transition from Rhodesia
to Zim babwe and allowed South-West Africa to become an
ind ep en d en t Namibia. Both had been on the fro n tlin e of
advancing comm unism prior to that. In 1990, South Africa
was to lift the ban on the liberation parties, release political
prisoners Nelson Mandela included and voluntarily take
part in a Convention for a Democratic South Africa (CODESA),
where all parties negotiated a settlement, agreed to rewrite
the constitution, and set a date for the first ever all-inclusive
elections.This came at about the same tim e as the other great
bastion o f non-democracy, the Soviet Union, was beginning
to disappear, and the connection may not be coincidental.
Africa noticed the unraveling o f the Soviet Union, and
the call for national conventions, new constitutions, respon
sible governance, and em pow erm ent o f people began to
reverberate th ro u g h o u t the continent. Under great public
pressures, facing the unprecedented grow th o f civil society
organizations, and suddenly facing international donors no
longer w illing to fund them , autocratic governments in Africa
began to respond, scheduling elections, and showing the
institutional face o f democracy by w riting constitutions and
Photos Courtesy Reuters

setting up supposedly independent judiciaries.The 1990s saw

a rash o f m ultipa rty elections and new constitutions, a trend
th a t has continued to this day. But at the same time, the "big
men" were not ready to give up easily, and they m anipulated
th e elections, p u t o ff co nstitu tion a l conventions, b ou gh t
o ff or intim idated opposition, sometimes ju s t ignored the
results o f elections, and hoped the West would be a b it more
interested in stability than in true democracy. For instance,
Kenya declared m ultiparty elections in 1992, and every elec
tion since has had violence, intim idation, and predictable
results. However, because th e co u n try was im p o rta n t to
the West in security and econom ic term s and things held
together relatively well after the elections, the results were
accepted each tim e by the international com m unity, includ
ing the 2007 elections which caused an International Criminal

Managing Director of the International Monetary Fund Christine

Lagarde and Senegalese President Macky Sail after a recent meet
ing over economic issues.
Court intervention over the levels o f violence they spurred.
The same happened in Nigeria over its past tw o elections, as
in Gabon, Madagascar, Benin, Ghana, Uganda, Ethiopia, and
alm ost every African country th a t has had elections since
1990. These elections did little to change anything in terms
o f the em pow erm ent o f people, o f real and legitim ate op
positions emerging, and o f Western democracy taking root.
M anipulation was the operative w ord fo r ruling parties, and
settling was the operative word for the watching w orld, as
in settling "for a substantially free and fair election th a t was
procedurally correct."
Another elem ent began to come into play in pressuring
governments to move to democratic processes: Official De
velopm ent Assistance (ODA) had to be tied to performance.
The term used by the US governm ent was "conditionality,"

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m e a n in g aid was c o n d itio n e d on a c o u n try 's progress in
raising liv in g sta n d a rd s fo r its p o p u la tio n , h a v in g o p e n ,
free, and fa ir elections, and o p e n in g o p p o rtu n itie s fo r all in
education, e m p lo ym e n t, and d e v e lo p m e n t. The p rin c ip le o f
c o n d itio n a lity was a basis o f W orld Bank and IMF p o lic y in
th e 1980s and is n o w com m onplace. It is enshrined in th e
U nited S tates'approach to g iv in g co u n trie s b illio n s o f dollars
fro m its M ille n n iu m C hallenge C o rp o ra tio n (MCC), started in
2004. To do so, countrie s have to c o m m it to "good policies,"
w hich th e co rp o ra tio n defines as "ru lin g justly, enco u ra g in g
econom ic freedom , and investing in people." The MCC w ebsite
emphasizes th a t those countries m ust enact m a rke t-o rie n ted
measures designed to open econom ies to co m p e titio n , fig h t
c o rru p tio n , and encourage tra n sp a re n t business dealings. In
a d d itio n , go ve rn m en ts m u st invest in th e ir citizens' health
care and education.There has been m uch criticism o f th e MCC
approach, as there was o f th e W orld Bank's stru ctu ra l a d ju st
m ent, b u t this criticism revolves m ore around im p le m e n ta tio n
rather than th e p rin cip le o f c o n d itio n a lity .

th is challenge comes fro m th e p e o p le as w ell as th e in te rn a

tio n a l co m m u n ity. Even th e A frican U nion (AU), th e body th a t
replaced th e OAU in 1999, has changed th e n o n -in te rference
codicil, created th e Peer Review M echanism to m o n ito r d e m o
cratic progress, and refused to recognize g o ve rn m ents th a t
com e to p o w e r by a coup.
This begins to m o u n t up as evidence th a t dem ocracy is
ta kin g root, and th a t m u lti-p a rty rule and s ta b ility are becom
ing th e norm . Freedom Flouse, in its 2012 Freedom Index, lists
27 o u t o f 49 sub-Saharan A frican co u n trie s a s "fre e "o r"p a rtly
free."The E conom ist In te llig en ce U n it (EIU), w h ic h uses a d if
fe re n t set o f criteria, had 21 A frican countries listed as "fu ll"
o r "fla w e d " dem ocracies, o r h yb rid regimes. 23 are listed as
autocratic. The EIU states in th e narrative o f its D em ocracy
Index th a t "th e n u m b e r o f elections held a n n u a lly in recent
years has increased; since 2000 b e tw een 15 and 20 elections
have been held each year. African dem ocracy appears to have
flourished and th e ho ld in g o f elections has becom e co m m o n
place, b u t n o t all ballots pass th e te s t o f b e ing 'free and fa ir'
and m any have been charades held by regim es clin g in g on to
power. Sim ilarly, coups d 'e ta t have becom e m ore infrequent,
a lth o u g h c o n flic t, fa ile d g o v e rn m e n ts , and hu m an rig h ts
abuses rem ain to o w idespread. For every tw o steps fo rw a rd
over th e past 20 years th e re has been at least one step back,
b u t th e overall tre n d appears to be in th e rig h t direction." N ot
a rin g in g e n dorsem ent, o f course, b u t it ce rta in ly recognizes
th a t th e m o v e m e n t is fo rw a rd and p o in ts o u t th a t th e coups
w h ich flo u rish e d fro m in d e pe n d e n ce th ro u g h th e 1990s at
a b o u t 20 per decade, have d im in ish e d so th e re have been
o n ly seven since 2000, and one o f those, in Guinea Bissau,
has resulted in th e co u p makers h o ld in g d e m o cratic elec
tions. H opefully, th a t w ill be th e case in Burkina Faso in th e
near fu tu re .

A band of vigilantes composed of a group of Nigerian traditional

hunters pose as they hunt for Boko Haram. Such instability on
the continent still poses grave issues for economic development.
W ith all this pressure, d o m e stica lly and in te rn a tio n a lly,
fo r th e esta b lishm e n t o f dem ocracy in Africa and th e dem ise
o f th e Cold War, A frica has b e g u n to change. Since 1990,
d e sp ite all th e resistance fro m e n tre n c h e d p o litic a l elites,
there have been repeated m u lti-p a rty e lections w h e re sit
tin g presidents lost and stepped d o w n peacefully. This has
happened in M auritius, Ghana, Somalia, Zam bia, Cape Verde,
Benin, SaoTom e and Principe, Botswana, Senegal, Nam ibia,
and elsewhere. S om etim es, th e elections have even seen a
change o f th e ru lin g p o litic a l party. Even w h e re old leaders
try to hang on th ro u g h e x tra -c o n s titu tio n a l means, it does
n o t happen w ith o u t a challenge anym ore. As has been seen
in Kenya, Senegal, Ethiopia, and m ore recently Burkina Faso,

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The tre n d s c e rta in ly seem to be p o in tin g to w a rd s an

Africa w ith a "cu ltu re " o f dem ocracy b e g in n in g to take root.
C ertainly dem ocracy rem ains fragile, as co m in g elections in
Burundi, th e Central African Republic, and Mali show us. Single
parties still d o m in a te th e landscape and m ilita rie s are still
liable to intervene. However, citizen dem ands fo r im m ediate
elections a fte r th e fo rc in g o u t o f P resident Blaise C om paore
in Burkina Faso a fe w m o n th s ago o r th e o n g o in g pop u la r
pressures fo r th e end o f long te rm presidencies in Equatorial
Guinea and C am eroon show th a t civil society has changed
and dem ocracy is d e m a n d e d by th e new, yo u n g , educated,
in fo rm a tio n te c h n o lo g y savvy, and a ctivist Africans w h o now
m ake up th e m a jo rity o f th e p o p u la tio n o f th e c o n tin e n t o f
one b illio n people. That is a b o u t as safe fo r dem ocracy as it
can be.
Is it th e E c o n o m y ?
Due to Africa's vast e co n o m ic p o te n tia l, relative stability,
b u rg e o n in g democracies, along w ith an increasingly m odern,
sophisticated, urbanized m a rke t and professional and e n tre
preneurial class, investors fro m EU and OECD co u ntries like
India, Japan, Brazil, and Turkey, as w ell as China have increas
in g ly begun to m ove in to th e co n tin e n t.T h e US private sector
is catch in g on, and th e US g o v e rn m e n t is h e lp in g to encour-

Photos Courtesy Reuters

PERSPECTIVES
age this through instruments like the Private Capital Group
for Africa, a group of high end capital investment firms with
whom the United States Agency for International Develop
ment (USAID) is partnering to foster"greater investment that
supports key development objectives in Africa," according
to USAID. This is laudable, as are trade promotion activities
by the Office of the US Trade Representative for Africa and
private sector initiatives by the Corporate Council on Africa.
For the United States, its major instruments of economic
outreach, the Africa Growth and Opportunities Act (AGOA)
and the Millennium Development Goals come up for renewal
or replacement in 2015, and a new administration and Con
gress will begin to look at opportunities for policy priorities.
The seminal question is:"should the African economy through
trade and investment be the priority for US policy?" There is
little doubt that the United States needs to fashion a compre
hensive, coordinated economic policy on Africa. Working with
the AU, the UN Economic Commission on Africa, the World
Bank, and the African Development Bank, as well as African
and US government and private sector stakeholders, there
could be no more positive or profitable nail to hang the US
policy hat on, a true win-win situation for all stakeholders. And
it would bring the United States in line with China, Europe,
and other investing nations to help create a level playing
field between the United States and other global emerging
powers. The United States must not live in the past. Today,
entrepreneurs from Brisbane to Sao Paulo, Seoul, and Beijing

ful economic policy.

But is the economy the centerpiece in US-African policy?
If not, should it be?

Or is it Terrorism and National Security?

There is little doubt that the US-Africa Leaders' Summit
was historic. There were about 40 heads of state, including
royalty, and never before has a US administration engaged
such a senior African leadership group at such a high level.
On the trade and investment side, the summit resulted
in some serious and significant commitments although very
little that was new money or policy from the US government
side. The only new inputs came from the private side. By my
count, there were new commitments in the neighborhood of
US$50 billion from the business community and only US$15
billion from the US government. All of this is welcome, but
does not represent a major change in policy direction or
magnitude as far as government is concerned. The most
positive trend here is the realization by the US business and
risk capital investment communities of Africa's potential. It is,
after all, the private sector that will have to drive sustainable
development. Government can only do so much.
On the security and peacekeeping side, while the United
States was not excessive in its commitments at the summit,
the ones it made show where its priority is now being placed,
if it was not already there. Obama announced the Security
Governance Initiative and committed US$65 million to sup-

"Due to Africa's vast economic p o te n tia l... investors from EU

and OECD countries like India, Japan, Brazil, and Turkey, as well
as China have increasingly begun to move into the continent."
reap super profits from their African ventures, in fact the high
est return on investment in the world.
From this standpoint, those advocating simple continuity
of AGOA or pushing for reform independent of the bigger
picture may actually be undermining a more progressive US
policy toward Africa even more dangerous to US progress
than traditional protectionist and isolationist views. Now may
be just the right time and right environment for the United
States to craft a more expansive program and economic ini
tiative for Africa an enhanced AGOA. Instructively, as the
United States' most significant Africa program, AGOA does,
indeed, present a baseline for a more equitably beneficial
partnership. While we now have or are seeking compre
hensive policies like the Transatlantic Trade and Investment
Partnership with the European Union and the Trans-Pacific
Partnership, there is no such animal for Africa. We need that
animal. We need coordination and consultation across the
spectrum of stakeholdersthe White House, private sector,
Congress, State Department, Department of Commerce, and
all the specific agencies taxed with trade policy and with
African governments and private sector to fashion a meaning-

port it. It will include six select countries: Ghana, Kenya, Mali,
Niger, Nigeria, andTunisia.The initiative will focus on building
institutions of good governance and the capacities of secu
rity sectors, including civilian ministries, police, and military,
depending on the needs of each country. It mandates close
consultation and cooperation with the host governments.
On peacekeeping, President Obama announced the African
Peacekeeping Rapid Response Partnership and committed
US$110 million per year for three to five years to build the
capacity of African militaries to rapidly deploy peacekeepers
in response to emerging conflict.This effort will be in partner
ship with the following countries: Senegal, Ghana, Ethiopia,
Rwanda, Tanzania, and Uganda. While this is only about a
US$600 million in total not much in the context it is build
ing on longer-term security commitments made in past years.
Security, it could be argued, was the focus of Cold War
era policy of the United States and certainly has remained so,
probably taking on a more prominent place in the last two
decades, even before the introduction of AFRICOM in 2007.
As ODA flows went only to countries the United States saw
as"allies"during the Cold War, or in humanitarian or disaster
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relief situations, it was easy to subordinate other policy con
siderations. However, the rationale that prioritizes security as
the leading consideration in US policy since the 1990s is less
clear and leaves the observer to find his or her own conclu
sion that Africa in general is not a high priority except where
it intersects with national global security concerns and the
"war on terror."
It then takes on a deeper concern and greater commit
ment of resources. Just a brief review of current Africa-based
"terror" concerns paints a pretty frightening picture. Al Shabaab, while losing ground to Kenyan-reinforced AU troops,
still operates in many parts of Somalia and has, in the last
tw o years, exported terror attacks to Uganda and Kenya.
Boko Haram runs rampant in northern Nigeria, kidnapping,
raping, and killing on a daily basis in a rebellion originally
prompted by legitimate grievances of neglect and exclusion
by the central government but now fueled by regional and
international linkages with radical Islamists. Northern Mali,
Niger, and the Sahel region are still combating, with French
assistance, rebel Islamist groups that include Ansar al-Dine,
MNLA (National Movement for the Liberation of Azawad), Al
Qaeda in the Maghreb, the Movement for Oneness and Jihad
in Africa, and some otherTuareg nationalist movements which
also had land and marginalization issues but have now come
under outside Islamist influence. Recently, existing tensions
around political contestations in the Central African Republic
have blossomed into a conflict that has taken on a ChristianIslam split as Islamist influences from Chad and elsewhere
forced terrified Central Africans to choose sides. Furthermore,
there has been serious talk by Islamists like the Al-Minbar
Jihadi Media Network, an Islamist website, of creating a "belt"
across the Maghreb from West to East Africa.
The US policy response has been predictable. Early efforts
have included the Pan-Sahel Initiative (PSI) of 2002 to 2004 in
Mali, Niger, Chad, and Mauritania, a counterterrorism effort;
and the Trans-Saharan Counter Terrorism Initiative (TSCTI),
(2005 to 2008), which replaced PSI and was an interagency
plan for 11 countries. In that time frame, there were at least
four other security and counterintelligence programs target
ing Africa. More recently, there has been the special training
of elite anti-terror forces in the Sahel region, the deployment
of Special Forces in Uganda and the Central African Republic
in support of the battle against the Lord's Resistance Army,
and the use of US drones for surveillance in Niger and in at
least two cases, possibly more, for striking an Al Shabaab
target in Somalia.
While funding for these programs is hidden amongst
a myriad of Department of Defense (DoD) and State De
partment budget lines, making totals almost impossible to
ascertain, we know the following: the TSCTI had an original
authorization from Congress for US$500 million, and there
are plans to fund the Security Partnership Initiative, referred
to above, at US$5 billion. Add to that recent creations like
the Partnership for Regional East African Counterterrorism
(PREACT), which includes 12 countries. While PREACT is run
through the State Department's Africa Bureau since its es
tablishment in 2008, the creation of AFRICOM has resulted
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in most of these programs being folded under its auspices,

including theTSCTI. AFRICOM's core budget is US$280 million
this year, a relatively modest amount, but one must remember
the six separate commands that fall under it, some in Europe
and some in Africa, like the Combined Joint Task Force-Horn
of Africa engagement of the Special Operations Forces in
Djibouti. Adding up these command budgets, along with
expenditures on International Military Education and Train
ing funds and foreign military sales, the total could amount
to US$7 billion or more.This estimate does not seem extreme
in light of the 2013 study authorized by the Department of
Defense for the International Security Advisory Board (ISAB),
which says that up to US$9 billion may make it into Africa
through the various budget lines from which funds are drawn.
(The calculation that the ISAB used was that US$25 billion is
set aside worldwide for security assistance, of which about
US$16 billion goes to Israel, Egypt, other Middle East coun
tries, Afghanistan, and Pakistan, the remainder being split up
around the rest of the world.)
If we follow the money "trail," as law enforcement tends
to do when tracking organized crime, we must conclude that
the priority of US strategic interests is in security and not
economic or infrastructure development, trade, or investment
and that this has been US policy on Africa at least since 1992
and probably long before. Whether this is shortsighted on the
US side or not, only time will provide the answer. We cannot
know what the future will hold or what trends will continue
and which ones will disappear, and whether the focus on
security shall remain supreme.
There is one directive spelled out by the president at the
August 2014 summit that gives hope that policy will match
reality. The hope lies in the fact that President Obama, in his
closing remarks at the summit, set the stage for continued
consultations at the highest level on all these issues and policy
considerations. He said:"Given the success that we've had this
week, we agreed that summits like this can be a critical part
of our work together going forward, a forcing mechanism for
decisions and action. So we agreed that the US-Africa Leaders'
Summit will be a recurring event to hold ourselves account
able for our commitments and to sustain our momentum.
And I'll strongly encourage my successor to carry on this
work, because Africa must know that they will always have a
strong and reliable partner in the United States of America."
This ongoing dialogue will allow for a reexamination of
strategic priorities, including moving from a focus on secu
rity to one on a comprehensive, coordinated economic plan
for US involvement in Africa. That would help create jobs
and profits for Americans, assist Africa in its own economic
progress across the board (essential for stability, peace, and
development), and, in the end, might be the only issue around
which international partnerships, or at least cooperation, can
be formed. Better yet, this area of trade and investment is one
of the few around which bipartisan coalitions can be formed
in our current polarized political atmosphere. i>l

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