SNG: Africa favours opportunistic free trade, foreign alliances

By Zawya11 hours ago Updated

By Staff Writer

Awareness of Africa’s most ambitious initiative, the African Continental Free Trade Area (AfCFTA) among its publics is dismal, despite its being operational for five years now. Ratified by 49 countries and signed by all except Eritrea, AfCFTA is a priority economic integration effort within the African Union’s Agenda 2063.

The latest edition of the flagship Afrobarometer survey finds that “only 13 percent of Africans have heard of the agreement”. Even in Ghana, which hosts its secretariat, only 17 percent of citizens are aware of it. Knowledge of the pact in East Africa is similarly appalling – Kenya (21 percent), Uganda (18 percent) and Tanzania (6 percent).

And the majority that know of it are the highly educated, and even then, not much more than one quarter of the educated in any single country know of the pact. This confirms the typical elite bias around public awareness of key policies and information in many countries on the continent.

Notwithstanding the “ignorance” about the pact itself, the principle of “free trade’ seems to get a big endorsement, with 62 percent rooting for trade with other countries. And this sentiment cuts across most countries – 32 of the 38 surveyed.

The report notes a peculiarity in Africa where dire economic circumstances do not align with greater public support for economic protectionism as seen in other regions. Instead, it anchors the call for more free trade across the board, not only confined to intra-African trade. This may be because of the reality that those economies are import and trade dependent even for the most basic of necessities.

This is an indicator of one of the most obvious implications of the failure to structurally transform the economies of many African economies. Also, the relative lack of public awareness of the AfCFTA and its potential benefits means that the public is not sold on the greater merits of stronger continental trade, pointing to an obvious area deserving of targeted and intentional policy intervention and civic education.

This need is even more glaring in a scenario of escalating international trade uncertainty and disruptions catalysed by the era of unpredictable and unilateral trade tariffs from the current United States administration. There is scope for unorthodox (but potentially beneficial) trade relationships as countries jostle to manage the effects of the disruption.

Although public knowledge of global powers and their influence may not be deep or sufficiently high, public perception among Africans seems to favour a pragmatic stance in the choice of alliances (or otherwise) with global powers. It would also appear that there is a reasonable level of public awareness of the roles and influence of China and the US.

This may be because in the case of China for example, its engagement with countries on the continent has grown rapidly in recent years – China is now Africa’s lead bilateral trade partner. Which may explain its favourable rating (in African public opinion) ahead of the US, which continues to lose favour as it veers from its traditional levers of foreign policy influence of aid and trade. Sustaining its ‘security lever’ may be yielding less than desirable effects in light of the decline of the other two levers.

Views fielded from 38 countries show that 62 percent of public opinion consider Chinese influence as “somewhat positive or very positive”, with only 17 percent viewing it negatively. Compared to about 50 percent favourable rating for the US and the European Union. For the latter, there is a notable drop in public ratings of their role as former colonial powers. The regime changing coups in Burkina Faso, Mali and Niger are illustrative of the extent of such negative public perception of the role and influence of former colonial power France.

This partly explains the positive regard for China and Russia in Mali (at 80 percent and 88 percent, respectively), in sharp contrast to the public view of the US and the EU at 40 percent and 30 percent, respectively.

As would be expected, country-level opinions show some variances to these general trends in perception. Among East African countries, the US receives more positive regard in Kenya (60 percent) compared to Tanzania (47 percent) and Uganda (46 percent). All three countries have a more favourable rating for China: Kenya (64 percent), Tanzania (61 percent) and Uganda (56 percent). China is notably much less popular in Ghana (33 percent) and Zimbabwe (35 percent).

One key takeaway from this broad public polling of Africans is that opinion favours rethinking foreign alliances and seeking opportunities in a multipolar world (as shifts occur with emerging powers) through multiple partnerships or neutrality – all in defence of self-interest and progress.

This may be about self-preservation, drawing lessons from unhappy historical experience with extractive alliances and more recent developments – such as Covid-19, Russia/Ukraine conflict and decline in aid – that are challenging multilateralism.

Atieno Ndomo is a Social Policy consultant with a keen interest in political economy.