Africa asserts autonomy as Nairobi Summit forges partnership of equals

Co-hosted by Kenya and France, the Africa Forward Summit, also known as Africa–France Partnerships for Innovation and Growth Summit, brought together Heads of State and governments across Africa. Also in attendance were French President Emmanuel Macron, United Nations Secretary General Antonio Guterres and African Union Commission (AUC) Chairperson Mahmoud Ali Youssouf.

The Summit resulted in a declaration signed by African nations and representatives of the French Republic, which seeks to strengthen the partnership between the African continent and France to advance inclusive growth and innovation.

In the declaration, Africa seeks to establish autonomy in its dealings with partners, which the continent believes would enable resilience and collective security capacities amid changing global power dynamics.

Here, the continent established the need for dialogue on geopolitical fragmentation, economic volatility and weakening multilateral consensus. This, the summit declared, has had implications for African peace and security dynamics.

Also, in a bid to achieve autonomy for the continent, Africa and France reached a deal for mutual benefits in the transfer of green technologies and collaboration to strengthen energy security and sovereignty. 

Globally, the African continent is known to be rich in natural resources, holding 30% of the world's mineral reserves, 40% of its gold, and up to 90% of chromium and platinum.

However, the continent suffers a “resource curse” due to the exploitation and mismanagement of these resources. 

The Africa Forward declaration seeks to address this by giving individual countries national sovereignty over their natural resources, including critical minerals. This framework targets promotion on local beneficiation, value addition and sustainable processing of Africa’s critical minerals to support industrialization, economic diversification and resilient regional value chains. 

In the partnership of equals strategy, France and Africa seek to strengthen regional value chains through continental integration and production of “Made in Africa” products. 

The continent has also fronted a framework to harness opportunities in the AI age, and focus on digital transformation that respects human rights, protects children and minors, respects cultural diversity, multilingualism and gender equality. 

Here, the continent seeks to strengthen its digital sovereignty through strategic autonomy that supports African-led ownership, hosting, processing, and value creation from data and AI.

This also includes supporting African language models, local datasets and AI systems.

During the Africa Forward Summit, talks of Africa’s autonomy also addressed the global financial systems, which have for long been seen to be unfair. 

Delegates referred to the international financial systems, which have exposed Africa to harsh credit systems and locked it out of meaningful borrowing. 

According to Guterres, the global systems have worked against the continent due to its lack of representation in decision-making bodies. 

“And without the voice, representation, and decision-making power it deserves inside the international financial institutions that shape its economy. It is not Africa that loses. It is the world that loses by the fact that the voice of Africa is not taken into account,” said Guterres. 

The Secretary General believes that Africa’s inclusion in the global system is also through changes in the United Nations Security Council, where African countries do not have permanent membership and veto powers.

Similar statements were made by Kenya’s President William Ruto, who advocates for Africa to get two seats in the Security Council.

At the summit, Ruto also advocated for partnerships built on sovereign equality and not on aid or charity. 

“The times before us demand stronger cooperation, renewed multilateralism, and partnerships grounded not in hierarchy, but in sovereign equality, mutual respect, and shared responsibility,” he said.